


This symmetry is not without meaning

by aesc, pearl_o



Series: Tough little baby telepath [5]
Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Still Have Powers, Anal Sex, Angst, Christmas, Hanukkah, M/M, Moving In Together, Mutant Politics, Mutant Rights, Size Kink, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-17
Updated: 2013-07-17
Packaged: 2017-12-20 12:28:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 63,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/887286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aesc/pseuds/aesc, https://archiveofourown.org/users/pearl_o/pseuds/pearl_o
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Charles and Erik have a stressful case and an even more stressful fight; Charles has a massive new friendcrush; new holiday traditions are made; and their relationship reaches a new level.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter one

**Author's Note:**

> In case you felt like there is still not enough Tough Little Baby Telepath in the world, here is some more for you!
> 
> The title is from Episode 24 ("The Mayor") of the wonderful podcast you should listen to because it will help stave off the existential horror and depression of your life, [Welcome to Night Vale](http://www.commonplacebooks.com/p/blog-page.html).

Charles knows what it's like to settle in for the long haul; he has a patience foreign to most twenty-year-olds. But the current case, dragging on for three months – with Erik splitting his time between active cases and what Charles thinks of as _their_ case – has worn that patience threadbare to the point of splitting. What he's doing right now, watching Erik stoically pushing his way through the technical details of the building's collapse, frays it a little more.

He keeps his restiveness in check as best he can, hiding it under the thin shield he uses to keep some of his more distracting thoughts from Erik. But Erik's either become attuned to Charles's moods or (as frightening) he simply knows Charles so well, because he looks up from his report with a wry smile. It's aggravating; Charles has consciously been keeping himself to himself, and he's sure he hasn't been shifting or sighing impatiently, but Erik's picked up on it anyway.

"It was only a matter of time, Xavier," he says in the old mocking tone that never fails to get Charles's back up. "We were going to run into a road block sooner or later."

"Fuck off," Charles growls, adding a slight telepathic shove, like pushing at Erik's shoulder. Erik laughs his quiet, huffing laugh, and goes back to work. Charles tries to do the same, focusing his attention on the pile of papers and aggravation in front of him.

That road block has been eight years in the making, built out of bureaucratic incompetence and an utter lack of evidence or useful witnesses. Oliver Vandevere, forty-three, had died when his townhouse had burned to the ground – for no reason, the engineers' reports said. Erik said cynically that the building going up in flames had been insult on mortal injury, given that the real cause of death had been inflicted before the fire. What that cause of death was, the coroner hadn't been able to say, given that the fire had left Vandevere a twisted lump of carbon in his easy chair. A stroke or arrhythmia, she'd hypothesized, but with no poison or obvious proximate cause. However it had happened, Vandevere had breathed his last before the fire started. 

Charles taps the medical file absently. "Erik, the fire inspectors said that fire was electrical, right?"

"Yeah," Erik says. He flicks through a few pages. "The wiring was completely fried, but Vandevere had just had the electrical system updated about three months before. The work passed inspection. And," Erik adds, "so did the technicians who worked on the project. The detectives working the first investigation cleared them."

It's nothing that Charles hasn't heard before, which doesn't make it any easier. He returns to his own work, turning over Vandevere's mysteriously-timed heart attack and the witness statements from past and present interviews, bringing them together.

"The heart runs on electricity, too," Charles says, although he's only half-thinking about that. Vandevere had been seen alive not two hours before his townhouse went up in flames; the handful of witnesses interviewed at the time had all sworn they'd seen a woman, or a teenaged girl, running across the street, away from the building. No one had gone after her, too busy trying to get other people in the block of townhouses to safety.

She leaps out in Charles's memory, though, a blurry snapshot captured from the memories of the few people they'd manage to find who'd seen the blaze. She's only a dark shape, no face, no identifying features, completely anonymous, but now, along with Vandevere's death, she assumes significance.

"Erik," Charles says, "do you... do you think the person who did this could have been an electrokinetic?"

Erik's hand goes still in the middle of turning a page. Charles can tell how much resistance he's feeling to the idea; there's a war going on in his mind between that automatic denial, _no, it can't be a mutant_ , and the part of him that's weighing the pieces the same way Charles just did, the part of him that makes him such a good cop. Other people might let that war go on for a few minutes before they make up their minds, but Erik only takes a split-second before he makes a decision. 

"They could be," Erik allows reluctantly. 

Charles sends him the memory of the dark woman that he's mulling over, and Erik sighs, scrunching up his face while he thinks. "Female electrokinetic, maybe in her twenties or thirties. Not a lot to go on." 

It's illegal to keep records based solely on mutation status or make reporting mandatory for employment – the last Supreme Court ruling on that was recent enough that it's within Charles's memory – so it's not as those they can just look her up in a database. They've already cross-checked Vandevere's phone records multiple times, and every call's been accounted for. Nothing helpful there, mostly take-out orders and drunk dials to his ex, no calls to younger women. 

"I didn't get anything from Jessica Kazimierz," Charles tells him. She had been eager to leave the relationship behind, but not to the point of wanting to incinerate her ex-boyfriend in his easy chair. Erik makes a frustrated noise, maybe hoping despite his objectivity that it would have been the human ex-girlfriend after all.

"The only other calls are to his parents and the company that did the contracting for his electrical work," Erik says as he closes up the last folder. He frowns at it, as if he can terrify it into giving up its secrets. "But... it would make sense for an electrokinetic to work for an electrical contractor. The first detectives on the case interviewed the technicians who worked on Vandevere's house, but they didn't mention any of the technicians being mutants. It wasn't long after Supreme Court ruled on the Waverley Act, so none of the workers would have had to disclose their mutation unless they wanted to. And none of the workers reported that they had a mutant colleague."

"So we would just need the company's employment records. Even if workers didn't disclose their mutation status, we'll have sex and birthdates, maybe photos." Charles bounces to his feet and over to the box containing the dossiers on the employees at Gerhardt Electrical Contractors. Erik follows him over, bending close – but not too close, keeping a decorous, professional distance, keeping his boundaries – to look over Charles's shoulder as he reads.

"GEC was on top of its paperwork," Erik says absently. He's warm, distractingly so; Charles wants to lean back, surround himself in Erik's heat and his fierce, straight-ahead focus. "All of their employees were bonded and licensed. Whoever we're looking for won't have a criminal record."

"But they might have had a reason to want Vandevere dead." Charles scans one page, two pages, three, four. He pauses. "Or... if our hypothetical electrokinetic were skilled enough, they might be a criminal. We just don't know."

"Electrokinesis would be useful in burglaries," Erik says musingly. Charles loves this part, watching Erik's mind take up an idea and forge it into something tightly defined, more real than a hypothesis, despite his reservations. "Shorting out alarm systems, killing lights without leaving fingerprints on switches or circuit breakers..."

Charles lets Erik's projections wash over him, incorporating them into the fabric of the tapestry they're weaving together while he goes through the contractor's files. Most of GEC's employees were male, and a good proportion were middle-aged. There's relatively few people who could theoretically fit that profile Charles saw in the neighbors' memories; the women he finds are also too old, and of the four of them, three are too tall and another, the owner's wife, had been away on maternity leave.

Erik reaches over Charles's shoulder to tap one of the pieces of paper. "Evelyn Russo, one of the technicians who worked on his house. Twenty-three at the time of the crime."

"It's as good a place as any to start," Charles says. If that goes nowhere, there are a few other leads in here worth pursuing. Assuming this isn't another red herring, and that the company is even the right place for them to be looking, and not just another frustrating dead end.

There's no point in thinking like that, Charles reminds himself. After almost a year, he thinks it might still be one of the worst parts of this job, his need for certainty. He can admire the way Erik weaves these stories and follows them so doggedly, the way he can turn around on a dime and throw it away as soon as it stops working, form a new one and start over again just as easily, but it doesn't stop Charles from feeling frustrated every time. Too many variables to pin down. It's the only time he really misses his Petri dishes and the lab, a place where he can control those variables and account for them.

Charles can feel Erik's excitement at the new theory, pumping through his body like his blood as he turns it over in his mind. It's only marred a bit by Erik's innate unhappiness at the idea of a mutant suspect – particularly for a nasty arson like this, and one with a human victim.

He knows that feeling; the entire community braces itself whenever a mutant is in the news for something criminal, or anything that causes the "mutant question" to rear its head again. Erik has an entire lecture that Charles has sat through three or four times by now, one he mostly agrees with but one he also doesn't. It's one of the few things they've fought over – and one of the few things that's gotten Erik to pull the _you don't know what you're talking about, you're a kid_ card. He'd been sorry afterward, but sorry more for saying the words than actually having thought them. Sometimes Erik's ideology runs too deep for Charles to change its course.

At least that's to the side for now, although Charles hopes he doesn't have to hear about it when they get home. Erik busies himself with tracking down Evelyn Russo's last-knowns and most-recents, clicking through databases on his laptop. Even though it's technically not part of what he does, Charles searches for suspicious, unsolved fires, with and without electrical renovations, trying to get a sense of pattern, if their still-hypothetical electrokinetic arsonist has done this before. He and Erik work better when they're both engaged in the case, and as frustrating as it can be, Charles loves the piecing-together of the truth, sifting through evidence to arrange it into a pattern that matches the reality it came from.

An hour or so on, he takes a break to get tea for himself and more atrocious station coffee for Erik. It's an oddly quiet day at the precinct, which means Charles wends his way through a purposeful hum of thoughts as the detectives on their floor work away at their own cases. He knows the textures of their thoughts almost by heart, from the adamantium-clad throb of Logan's to the deceptively serene surface of Ororo's, even the cold spikiness of Emma's. They help give shape to his day, surrounding him with familiarity.

There's a new ripple in his topography now, though, blazing like the fires in the cauldron of a volcano. It isn't the hypnotic sun-off-steel glare of Erik's mind, but something different – a flame, burning bright as the red hair of its owner.

She's not at the station, but surprisingly close by. He stretches out, just a little, and finds her sitting in a coffee shop about two blocks away, bundled up and drinking hot chocolate with Scott by her side.

_What are you two up to?_ Charles sends.

Jean's mind blooms with a warm. welcoming pleasure. It's unlike the way anybody else has ever responded to his telepathy, and Charles is still surprised every time. _Charles, hi!_

It's been almost two months since he met Jean. He'd started hanging out with Scott, Alex's little brother, regularly just as he started his freshman year of college, and he'd been surprised by how much he liked his company. The introduction to Scott's new girlfriend was only a few weeks later, and Charles had hit it off with her as well. 

A big part of Charles is still dizzy with the realization that he has actual _friends_ , people his own age that he likes and can talk to. He's never had that before. He's always been too different, too young, too _something_. But with Scott – and with Jean, especially – he feels like he fits in. He's never hung around people more or less his age, and never with another telepath.

There's a difference in talking like this to another psionic, Charles thinks. It's easier, more natural, Jean's thoughts flowing to him naturally, dense with emotions, subtext, and associations that most other people's projected thought lacks. Jean's telepathic abilities are late-blooming compared to her telekinesis, but she's learning quickly, and Charles is sure she has the potential to be brilliantly powerful. Instead of explaining herself in words now, she sends him a packet of thoughts: Alex's shift is almost over, and Scott and Jean are waiting for him to get off work, so they can all go to dinner together. 

She's included a question in it, as well – they could stop by and say hello to Charles in person...? Charles sends back an immediate negative to that as he finishes fixing his and Erik's drinks. _On the hunt_ , he sends back and grins at the burst of amusement from Jean.

_Have fun_ , she replies, teasing and regretful at the same time, and then fades away, her attention focusing on Scott again.

"What are you smiling about?" Erik says, taking the coffee from Charles's hands as Charles sits down again. 

"Jean," Charles says. He pulls his laptop over to him and prepares to start the search anew. "She and Scott are around; I was just talking to her. They're going out to dinner with Alex later."

"That's nice," Erik says into the lid of his coffee. He takes a sip, holds it in his mouth for a moment before swallowing heavily. The silence this creates is thick with unease, a few dark, disapproving thoughts Erik tends to have about Scott and even some for Jean, but Erik pushes them down and away quickly. They have the tenor of the things Erik usually thinks but doesn't say, and Charles usually lets them go. It grates, a little, but Charles doesn't let himself look too closely at what lies underneath Erik's more asshole-ish thoughts. 

Erik sighs, a vaguely exasperated sound. "If you're done socializing, we need a few more hours to put in on this."

"Oh, playtime's over?" Charles snipes. Erik's riding right on the edge of being patronizing, and Erik knows it but can't help it. Or doesn't want to.

Erik eyes him crossly but doesn't rise to the provocation. "If you want to look at those arson records while I look into our suspect's background, that would be nice. We might be able to get out to interview Russo this afternoon, unless you've got more important plans."

"Yessir," Charles mutters. He calls up the files he needs and begins to search through them, his good mood from earlier darkening. It darkens to something approaching annoyed as he reads, filtering out five more suspicious fires with no obvious cause – all fires in houses scattered across the five boroughs, all with electrical work done in the eight months previous. Although GEC hasn't been named as the company on those projects, the data is just more proof that the person they're looking for might be an itinerant electrical contractor.

He jots down notes about the fires, the dates and the companies, and slides it across the desk to Erik. Erik takes only a moment to look down and absorb the information.

"Russo hasn't stayed with one company longer than eighteen months since the Vandevere fire," Erik says. "She's worked for three of these companies since then."

Charles nods impatiently, and Erik gives him a cool look in return. Erik's playing with his pen, tapping it against the desk without seeming to notice he's doing it, twirling it around in his hands. Erik doesn't have a lot of tells; between his stone face and his perfectly groomed hair and clothes, the pointless playing is the only physical sign of how much he's processing in his mind. 

Erik gives him a silent rundown of the suspect's background: grew up in the city, average education, parents died a few years back, the unsteady employment history Erik already mentioned. She has no criminal background, not even sealed juvenile records, and no known affiliation with the kinds of mutant extremist groups that sometimes make it on to terrorist watch lists. There's not a lot there that's particularly noteworthy, certainly not any mention of her mutation status. Erik has a current address for her in Washington Heights. 

"Are we going to talk to her today?" Charles asks, although he already has his answer: purpose and focus are coming off of Erik in waves, an intent that says he's not going to wait, not when he has the bit in his teeth.

"There's no point in waiting," Erik says. He rises gracefully to his feet, reaching for the jacket draped across the back of an empty chair. It's the work of only a moment for Erik to straighten himself again, his tie neat underneath the perfectly-set points of his collar and his jacket buttoned up over the service weapon he keeps in its underarm holster. Charles halfheartedly swipes at his own hair, which earns him a crooked, if distracted grin from Erik and a teasing, "We'll be here all day waiting for you to get that mop of yours in order."

"Oh, fuck off," Charles grumbles. That's teasing too, and familiar, enough to take the edge off Erik's foreboding and Charles's annoyance with him. He sends a quick _duty calls_ to Jean, who's distracted by Alex arriving at the coffee shop but sends back _wish you could join us!_ , heartfelt enough that Charles half-wishes they could put this off for tonight.

Doing something else might have bought them some time to get ready for whatever's waiting for them when they meet Evelyn Russo. Erik's already dead-set on the interview, though, going through the questions in his head, plans for any possible contingency, from Russo not being home to her attacking them. Mixed in are thoughts about controlling the fallout, a brief flicker of regret that Charles isn't allowed to manipulate the perceptions of anyone watching Russo's questioning or arrest. If people know Russo's a mutant, that kind of knowledge would spread like wildfire – or, Charles thinks darkly, a house fire.

For himself, he sets himself to reviewing the protocols for a telepathically-monitored interview. Not that he needs to review them, knowing them by heart as he does, but it fills the time and the quiet humming of Erik's car. _You cannot use your telepathy to advise your partner of the subject's guilt or innocence_. _You cannot use your telepathy to coerce a confession_. The list of things he's allowed to do is fairly short, shorter when it comes to dealing with suspects; all he can do is suggest certain lines of questioning to Erik based on simple surface scans of emotions, rather than thoughts, which isn't easy considering how closely the two can be intertwined. He tries to keep his own frustration to himself at that, although he's not sure how successful he is. Maybe, if he could do more, this would have been over sooner.

The closest parking space Erik's able to find is a few blocks away from Russo's apartment. Charles trails behind Erik as they walk, going extra quickly just to keep up with Erik's rapid pace. It reminds him of the first few weeks they worked together, when Erik would do this specifically to get a rise out of him. Today, Erik's merely too wrapped up in the conversation to come to think about it, and Charles has to remind himself that Erik's preoccupation should make it less annoying.

It hasn't snowed yet this year, but it's started to get cold already, and the wind's heavy today, with November just turning the corner into December. Charles wishes he'd brought his hat or a scarf or something to bundle up a bit more, now that the sun's down behind the building and the wind whips through the spaces between them, so much colder than it had been this morning. Erik isn't wearing so much as a coat over his suit jacket, much less gloves or hat; Charles can't even sort out on a day like today whether it irritates him or makes him feel fond, wanting to take care of Erik, _make_ him take care of himself better. Both, probably.

When they arrive, they discover that the elevator's out in Russo's building, so they climb up to the third floor. Erik's mind has settled into a thoughtful seriousness as he's prepared himself for the interview. He knocks on Russo's door, all confidence and anticipation.

Charles knows, before she even opens the door, that they're right about this much at least: Russo is definitely a mutant. It's something he can always tell immediately from the texture of someone's mind, as impossible to mistake as looking at someone and seeing whether they're young or old, or the color of their hair. He can't tell Erik, though, without going over one of his guidelines, and for that matter, he has to consciously stop himself from accidentally going any further and seeing what her mutation _is_.

_She's electrokinetic, definitely_ , Erik sends. Charles nearly startles, as if – ha – a jolt of electricity has gone through him. _Electromagnetism_ , Erik clarifies, sparing a tiny bit of smugness for the thought. _She... distorts electrical fields, maybe? But she feels different. The metal around her feels different._

Erik's thoughts cut off as the door swings open. Charles can't read any threat from the other side of the door, but it's best to be sure. It could be the sudden electric tingle in the air, as if the very molecules around them are jittering, or it could be the sense of grim foreboding from Erik, Charles doesn't know; either way, he holds himself ready. His telepathy coils up tight inside him, waiting for him to pull the trigger.

Russo's face appears in the sliver of space between the door and the frame. It's work-tanned, and hardened and roughened with something beyond work. She eyes Erik's badge with suspicion, and Charles with uncertainty.

"Can I help you gentlemen?" she asks. Her voice sounds scratched and raw, as if she's trying to speak through smoke. "Is this about my noise complaint? Because I swear those jerks – "

"No," Erik says. He's wearing his polite-officer-of-the-law mask, one that manages to be frightening even though Erik means it to be approachable. "I'm Detective Erik Lehnsherr, and this is my partner, Charles Xavier." Charles nods when Russo gives him a quick once-over. "This is in regards to some work you did for Bowman Electric last year."

"I don't work with them anymore," Russo says. Charles catches the edge of her tension sharpening at the mention of the company whose work had been associated with the most recent unsolved fire. Although he's not reading her, her mind brushes against his like static. "We parted okay, never had complaints about my work. I've got references from them. What's going on?"

"May we come inside?" Charles asks. Even though he doesn't question suspects or witnesses, sometimes him speaking up helps. _It's that innocent face of yours_ , Erik likes to say. _They have no idea what a terrible boy you are._

In Charles's experience, most people want very badly to say no to that request, but very few of them do. Evelyn Russo's no exception to that rule, her mind practically screaming out her reluctance at him even as she grunts out a "I guess" and begins to unlock the door to let them in. 

The apartment's surprisingly bright inside, and warm, crowded but neat for the most part. There are various bits of machinery scattered across the kitchen table, none of which Charles recognizes. 

Russo holds herself carefully apart from the two of them - there's something there, Charles thinks, some kind of fear, even beyond whatever suspicions or worries she might have regarding the police. It takes a moment for it to occur to him that it might be as simple as the fact that she just let two strange men into her apartment. If he stretches himself a little, he can feel her reaching for her power, ready at the slightest provocation, not to attack, but to defend herself.

Charles smiles at her, moves slowly to sit down on the couch when she gestures jerkily. It's easy enough to let him slip into his most non-threatening aspect. There's not much he can do about Erik, though.

Erik's paused by the kitchen table, apparently studying the parts set out atop it. Charles, as battened-down as his telepathy is right now, senses Erik feeling the metal out, ascertaining what it does and what it's for.

"Micro-generators?" he asks.

Russo blinks, her thoughts faltering at the question before rallying to catch up. The apparent small-talk doesn't soothe her; nothing but Erik and Charles being out of her apartment and out of her life would do that. She swallows soundlessly before saying, "Yeah. Just a side project. With the economy being the way it is and all, it's been rough finding work."

"It's always harder finding work if people know you're a mutant." Erik actually sounds sympathetic; he is, Charles knows. "I imagine word gets around, even if you haven't disclosed your status to your employer – and even if they're not supposed to take your status into account when they're interviewing you."

"How did you..." Russo's gaze flicks between Erik and Charles, settling on Erik when he lifts a piece of the generator with his abilities. She's torn now, between trusting one of _her kind_ and being even more wary; she still doesn't know what Charles is. "Metallokinetic? Nice. How'd you know what I was?"

"Electrokinetic," Erik says simply. "Complementary abilities."

Russo nods and offers Erik a tentative smile that disappears when she nods at Charles. "What about him?"

This is the part Charles always dreads. He keeps the same friendly, open, harmless expression on his face as he answers. "I'm a telepath."

He keeps in the sigh that wants to escape as Russo visibly stiffens, her mind rebuilding any small chips Erik might have just succeeded in making in her walls. He scoots on the couch so he can reach the back pocket of his jeans and get out his wallet. Erik crosses the room to take the card from his hand and give it to Russo; she's not going to come to Charles, not now, and it's only bound to freak her out more if he approaches her at this point.

Erik giving out his mutation is an option, something in his bag of tricks and strategies he can choose to use or not, left to his discretion. It's not like that for telepaths or other psionics. If they ask, he's legally required to divulge, just like he's legally required to keep the card on him when he's working. It's supposed to be an aid for him, with its cheerful font, quick FAQs, and reassuring reminders of peoples' rights when dealing with telepaths. Erik thinks of it more like a dog license. _It's okay_ , he'll say sardonically. _You're one of the nice mutants. Look, you have all your shots, you're neutered, you don't even bite!_

Erik's doing well at keeping it off his face now, though, despite the dark flicker of righteousness Charles can feel from him. He's watching Russo, waiting patiently while she looks over the card, biting her thumbnail as she does so.

"This says I can ask you to leave if I don't want you questioning me," Russo says finally, glancing up and giving Charles a careful look.

"Of course," Charles says. 

"I'll answer _your_ questions," she says to Erik, "but just you."

_This might actually be good_ , Charles sends Erik, soothing down the anger that he knows Erik's hiding. _I know you're not used to me being bad cop and you being good cop, but if it means she's going to trust you and open up to you more..._

He gets back a wave of anger from Erik, followed quickly by grudging acceptance of Charles's point. _This is how they keep us divided, you know, being afraid of what abilities someone else might have_ is his parting shot – it's not one Charles can argue with, but it's annoying all the same – before he turns his attention entirely to Russo. He folds himself into the other empty chair, taking a moment to straighten his jacket and trousers.

"You've worked for a lot of companies over the past ten years," Erik says.

"Like I said," Russo grimaces, "guys find out you're a mutant and you get shit for it. It's already hard enough, being a woman. All it takes is for one guy to catch you using your powers to fix a bad circuit and that's it." She bites her lower lip. It's not a vulnerable thing, Charles sees; it's to edit herself, keep back the even angrier words she wants to spit out. "One of the last places I worked for, they knew about my mutation for all of five minutes before they pink-slipped me."

"Discrimination based on mutation status is illegal." Erik might appear to be lounging calmly in his chair, but he's fooling no one; his eyes are fixed sharp on Russo's face, anger coiling underneath his skin. Charles knows most of that anger is for the system, for Russo being victimized by it. Russo's thoughts pulse with truth; she's not lying. "Did you ever seek legal advice? Mutant Legal Aid and the MCCR would have helped you file suit."

"They always had a reason." Russo shakes her head and laughs bitterly. "Not enough work, bad performance review, couldn't get along with colleagues... Sometimes I just quit; I didn't need to be a telepath," she flicks a mistrustful glare at Charles, "to see what they were thinking about me. And I don't want charity. Never have. I'll fight my own fight, thanks."

Erik sparks bright with admiration, but the brightness spirals quickly down, darkening. Charles's own insides clench; he knows what's coming, can hear the words ringing in Erik's head even before he says them.

"You worked for five companies who had contracts for restoring and updating old electrical systems," Erik says softly. He almost sounds compassionate, understanding. "GEC, Master Conductors, Washington Heights Electric, Waterford, and Bowman all worked on refurbishing projects. Five of those projects had been finished for only a few months before they burned down. You were on all five of those projects."

Russo's still standing, leaning against the wall. Charles isn't great at body language, but even he can tell her position is practically shouting at them to hurry up and get out as soon as possible. She crosses her arms as Erik speaks, not taking her eyes off of him for a second. She's silent for a few moments after he stops.

"I'm sorry," she says, sounding almost – almost, but not quite – apologetic, "but I don't think I heard a question there."

If she wasn't almost certainly a murderer, Charles reflects, and if she hadn't turned out to be so suspicious of Charles's mutation, Erik could have actually liked this one. 

"Ms. Russo," Erik says, "we have five unsolved fires, with one solid link connecting them. That link is you. One of those fires involved a man's death. I'm sure you can see why it's important that we get all the information from you that you're able to give us."

Russo shakes her head. "What reason would I have to burn those houses down, _if_ I did?"

"Justifiable resentment," Erik says. "Those baselines screwed you over," _damn straight_ , Russo's mind all but shouts, "and I can see why you'd want payback. Or maybe the customers you worked for thought a woman shouldn't be on the job, much less a mutant. The man who died, Oliver Vandevere, supported the Purifier candidate for councilman in the elections that were held just before he died. You must have seen his bumper stickers and propaganda every day."

"You actually care that some bigot baseline died?" Russo asks incredulously. She sucks in her breath, falling sharply silent. Charles tries not to react to the throb of frustration coming from Erik; he'd been hoping to shock a confession out of her, but she'll be more on her guard now. "I guess I can't expect any better from a fellow mutant who works for the system."

For himself, Charles is working frantically through all the evidence stored in his head, collating, sorting, analyzing. Russo's thinking her way around to the obvious point: they might have motive, but there's no way to connect her conclusively to the fires. All they have is circumstantial; it might be enough to convict her in the biased court of public opinion, but it won't get much more than a quickly-granted dismissal motion in the court that matters.

_Robbery_ , he sends to Erik. _Items were reported missing from safes that were supposed to be fireproof. Jewelry, mostly. Cash. She says work's been thin, she's bounced around. She won't take charity._

"You've got a nice apartment," Erik says. Charles can feel him trying to keep his abilities to himself; even though they've been invited in, without a warrant he can't use his abilities to look for stolen property that isn't in plain sight. "You've been between jobs for a while now. Given your earnings, I don't see how you can afford this place."

"I'm good at saving," Russo says flatly. "And living within my means. I have to be."

Erik sighs, leaning back and crossing one leg on top of the other. He bites his lip, frowning at the window. "I know you don't trust me right now," he says after a moment. "And believe me, I'm sure you have plenty of good reason not to trust the police. I know how these things go. I've been there. There's a reason I became a cop, okay, and it wasn't just to keep up the status quo and make friends with the baselines who despise us." He leans forward now, letting his hands hang between his legs, giving Russo a deep and concentrated look that almost takes Charles's breath away. "Look, Ms. Russo, I know this is hard for you to believe, but I want to help you. I'm sure you had your reasons for whatever happened, and I want you to have a chance to have your say without this discrimination and bullying and bigotry getting in the way. But I can't do anything for you if you don't tell me the truth."

It's a performance, of course – a magnificent one, Charles thinks – but at the core, all of it's true, too, and part of Russo can obviously see that shining through. She's shaken by it, visibly, tucking her hands into her armpits as she hugs herself more tightly. 

"This is bullshit," Russo says, a little less certainty in her voice. She glances over to Charles again, and Charles has to almost wince as he feels her decide he's an acceptable release for her anger as she lets it flare up again. "Look, I want – can he go? I don't want him here anymore."

"Of course, Ms. Russo." Charles sends a fierce _no you will not_ to Erik, who's balanced right on the edge of protesting, his own mind filling with an anger that overwhelms whatever Russo has to offer. "I'll meet you down at the car, Detective."

He lets himself out unobtrusively and makes his way back downstairs. Now that he's been told to leave he can't scan Russo anymore, but he can still stay in contact with Erik and give him any pertinent bits of evidence as he works through them. And, Charles has to admit as he finds a warm corner of the lobby to wait in, he _wants_ to be close in case something happens. Lewis Mayfair turning on Erik is still sharp in his mind. While he knows Erik can hold his own against almost anyone – in terms of sheer power he and Charles are a match – he hates the thought of Erik being where Charles can't help, even if that help isn't needed. It might be; Russo's definitely familiar with her power and comfortable using it if she feels threatened.

Erik talks for a while, the soft, detached tone that Charles associates with talking about his old memories – about his mother, usually, sometimes Shaw. He follows the trail of Erik's voice up and down, until it reaches the end: "I wouldn't be here if I didn't think I would be able to back up what I've told you in court, Ms. Russo. But I also wouldn't be here if I didn't believe I could help you."

There's a pause before Russo speaks again. When she does, it's to say, "You're for real, aren't you?"

A small thrill, bursting through Erik; Charles knows him well enough to know that it's not showing at all. "Yeah. I am," Erik says. "I don't think you're a bad person. And I can tell you, it's not worth it, letting things eat you up inside."

The door to the lobby opens, letting in the cold air as one of the building's residents steps inside. Charles pulls his jacket tighter around him, curling up tighter in the single chair, as he waits with Erik for Russo's response. It's a long wait, but Erik knows how to be patient, when he's this close. 

"I didn't kill that guy," Russo says, finally, breaking the stalemate. Her voice still sounds accusatory, angry, defensive more than anything else; Charles can't look to see what she's using it to cover up. "He just... collapsed or something, I don't know. I didn't do anything to him. He wasn't even supposed to be home."

"I believe you," Erik says. He sounds like he genuinely does; in his head, he's willing to give Russo the benefit of the doubt. None of the other fires have had casualties, Charles knows; the four other victims and their families had been out, whether out of town or gone to spend an evening with friends. It's possible Vandevere really was supposed to be anywhere but home whenever Russo did whatever she'd gone to his home to do. "It's a long way from our kind of anger to murder. We don't all have it in us."

_I do_ , Erik thinks, in the dark, secret place he always hopes Charles never sees. Charles sees everything, of course; his mind is too entangled with Erik's now for him not to. He ignores that as best he can, because he knows it's true. Erik's anger _is_ that powerful; it's tested the limits of his control to breaking. "I don't see it in you," Erik says to Russo, with a conviction that's nearly overwhelming.

"He called me a _mutie freak_ when he realized what I could do," Russo grinds out. "He almost wanted me kicked off the job, but Jess, my supervisor, talked him out of it... I didn't want him dead, I swear, I just wanted..."

"You wanted something of your own," Erik says. "Something to make up for the rest of it."

"It's not like any of those people deserved the things they had!" Russo snaps. There's still an almost pleading tone to it, though; she _wants_ Erik to understand her, now that it's come to it. And the thing is, Erik does. "And they all had insurance, too, they weren't going to miss it..."

Erik stands up from the chair, slow, easy movements, nothing that could possibly startle her or catch her off guard. "You know I'm going to have to arrest you now and bring you in."

Russo hisses out a breath. "I know – I just... You promised you would help me, right? You'll take care of me?"

"I swear I'll do everything in my power to help you with this," Erik says, conviction in his voice and mind both so strong Charles shivers a little.

Charles zones most of the way out of the conversation as Erik begins to give her Miranda rights, only enough attention focused on them so that he'll be aware if anything in the energy changes, if Erik needs him to intervene. He doubts it's going to happen at this point, though. He stares down at his own hands in his lap, twisting his fingers against each other just for something to pay attention to.

Usually when they make an arrest it feels like a weight off of him. Right now he just feels a vague sense of worry he can't quite place.

He keeps himself small and unobtrusive as Erik brings Russo down the stairs. Erik doesn't have her cuffed; Charles knows the risk he's taking, balancing Russo's fear against her trust in him. As they come down the last flight, Russo tenses. She's seen him, of course, and knows exactly who and what he is – but all her anger's gone out of her, and she doesn't have the energy to argue that he must have influenced her, coerced her into confessing in some way. Instead, she's _tired_. Even without looking, Charles knows she's relieved all the years of hiding and keeping the secret that's weighed her down are over. 

She's not evil. The more hysterical elements of the media will paint her that way, though, with the old brush and colors of the not-so-long-ago days of registration and cure-seeking. In his experience, limited as it is, the barest handful of people are what someone might call _evil_. As Russo and Erik walk together through the door, Charles senses how alike they are, how very few degrees separate what Erik is from what Evelyn Russo had become.

It's why Erik's determined to protect her as best he can, although he knows at some point his protection is going to fail. It's why, with every step, with Erik opening the newly-arrived squad car door, with Erik promising to ride with her – meaning Charles will have to taxi back, or get Ororo, who's come along with her partner and the squad car, to drive him. He can't compromise the rapport Erik's built with Russo, not now, and he can't curl his thoughts around Erik's to smooth out the rough edges of anger and frustration, not without violating the boundaries Erik's set up.

He decides on the taxi; he doesn't feel like talking to anyone, or asking for favors, even one as small and unimportant as this one. On the way back to the station he tries to plan out the rest of the day. Erik's going to be too distracted to pay attention to him, even after they get off work tonight. Charles might as well head back to his apartment. It's been a while – God, a full week since he was there last, he realizes with a start, doing the math in his head. The realization is a little frightening. Erik's place is what he thinks of as home now, as often as not. His apartment might as well just be where he stores his clothes and picks up his mail. 

As Charles gets out of the cab, he stretches out lightly for Erik's mind. He's concentrating hard, busy, and he sends back an impatient _Not now, Charles_ as soon as he feels Charles's presence. Charles retreats immediately, familiar with Erik's rebuffs, but raw as he is from Russo, he can't help but feel hurt by it. 

Erik's asshole tendencies have been at the forefront lately, a phenomenon Charles has put it down to frustration over the case running so long. Charles has been pretty much the only one he's been civil to in the past few weeks; even Moira's thrown her hands up and told Charles, only half-joking, that she doesn't understand how Charles can stand to be around him one second more than he has to be. He's better with Charles, of course, than he is with other people, but that's only part of the answer. 

Charles has to wonder, now, if things are only going to get worse now that they've solved this case, instead of getting better like they always have before.

He tries to push those thoughts to the side so he can concentrate on his own paperwork before going to see Moira. His mind won't let him, though; he can feel worry and the old urge to just _go_ and run circling just beneath the surface like waiting sharks. Charles shakes his head to shake those thoughts free, but they won't let go, with their teeth sunk in him now. All he can do is try to put the best part of his focus into finishing. Erik had put himself out there for Evelyn Russo, he reminds himself, left himself vulnerable; Charles can repay him by staying out of his head and making sure the paperwork is flawless.

Once he's without the distraction of filling out forms, though, the impulse to leave – and the plans to do so – roar back, full force. Charles hurries through collecting the files off the printer, dashing his signature off so sloppily it's a good thing, he thinks with a laugh, that his writing is so messy anyway. One copy he paperclips for Erik's review, adding a post-it with a hopefully-legible _going back to my place tonight, see you tomorrow_ on it. The other he tucks into a folder and, once he's put Erik's copy on his desk, goes with it to Moira's office.

She's busy, of course, but not too busy to look up with a quick sympathetic smile. Of course she knows, Charles thinks; she's known Erik for ages, and she knows Charles better than most people. It's easy to forget she's a detective sometimes.

"Got something for me?" she asks.

"Yeah." Charles hands the file over, has to struggle not to fidget while she peruses it.

It feels like it takes her forever to get through it, although Charles knows it's really not very much time at all. She looks up at him when she finishes and nods. 

"It looks good," Moira acknowledges. "That was good work with your breakthrough today."

"Erik was the one who did all the work," Charles said. "The suspect wouldn't even let me in the same room with her."

He realizes as soon as the words leave his mouth that there's an unpleasant whiny undertone to them, but one of the best things about Moira is how easily she ignores things like that, any hint of self-pity or fishing, like it never even happened. She does say, thoughtfully, "The reason I let you and Lehnsherr stay partners is because you get shit done. Good partners cover each other's gaps. I doubt Lehnsherr would have made the leap to looking for a mutant."

Moira turns back to the paperwork on her desk. Charles stands there, awkwardly, biting his lip, until she looks up at him again, eyebrows raised. 

"Was there something else you needed?"

Charles shakes his head. "No, ma'am."

Her eyes narrow at the title, and the familiarity of it makes Charles smile. "Go home, Charles," Moira says, and he obeys.

He's not going to splurge on a taxi twice in one day, so it's the subway for his commute back to the apartment. He still has a couple dollars on the old Metrocard in his wallet, which feels like a small victory. As cold as it is outside, the train feels overheated and stuffy; he's sweating in his coat. His car is only half full, and he sits down and stares at the ads across the aisle, plastic surgery or buying beer or going to the museum.

The subway always reminds him of Erik – more so, even, than the way just about everything reminds him of Erik these days. It's the metal, of course, surrounding him like a cocoon. Erik's told him stories about how, when he was in high school and just had to get out of his foster home for a while, he would just go and ride the subway for hours and hours, no destination in mind. It would soothe him with its endless metal passageways and the capsule of steel surrounding him, calming him down.

_The tracks have purpose_ , Erik had explained, sounding both fond and impatient at the same time – embarrassed at exposing something so deeply-felt, yet wanting to share it all the same. _And the foundations and sub-basements of all the buildings sunk into the earth, the cables... Everything. I loved it._

Erik takes comfort from single-minded focus and dedication, courses of action that are unwavering and direct. His other escape is running, which he's been doing a lot lately, up with a quick kiss while Charles is barely awake enough to register it, mind already set on dressing, finding his running shoes, the route he'll take today. He comes back sweaty and shaking, the worst of his energy burned away but ready to flare back into life once he's recovered.

And Charles... He wants to laugh at himself. He has his _escaping_ , vanishing out of the world and into nothingness. Maybe he should do that tonight, he wishes he could so much, but the case is still going and if Erik calls or comes over, Charles won't come back, not until he's ready. He could tell Erik his plans – and, Charles sighs, he could get a mental slap on the hand for his troubles. Tension builds in him at the thought, remembering Erik's rebuff earlier, the rough edges that have been building like terrain becoming rockier as he struggles upward.

By the time he gets home, he's worn out with too many people and too much thinking, worn out enough that he almost misses the envelope shoved under his door. It has a boot-print on it by the time he picks it up, and some of the dirt smudges on his fingers as he pulls the paper out.

_Dear valued tenant_ , it reads, only _tenet_ instead of _tenant_. Charles sighs. _This is a reminder that your lease expires on January 15. If you intend to renew your lease, check the box for the lease option that best suits you. If you intend to vacate the apartment, please inform leasing office of your plans no later than Dec. 15. Thank you, Staff at Property Management_

Oh. Well. That's ... that's great, really.

It's not like Charles hasn't known the end of his lease is coming up, of course, but he's been managing to avoid thinking about it too closely. There's been enough other things going on to distract him, after all, and it's not like it's been something _requiring_ his attention. This is different. This is a deadline, and a big decision, either way.

He strips off jacket and shoes, leaving them in a pile at his entrance way, and falls onto the couch, lying down on his back with his feet hanging over the arm, still holding the piece of paper. 

_Look at it logically, Charles_ , he tells himself sternly, staring up at the crack in the ceiling. _You admitted it yourself, earlier – you hardly spend any time here as it is. You don't really live here anymore, not really. It doesn't make sense to pay two rents. Erik's place is nicer, and more convenient, and it has a dishwasher and a washing machine, and..._

And Erik wants him to move in. It's been there in the back of Erik's mind for months and months now. He tries to hide it, not wanting to spook Charles by asking for too much or too soon. Charles appreciates the consideration and resents it at the same time. But Charles can see it, even if Erik doesn't say it out loud or project it to him, sometimes when they're kissing, or when they wake up tangled together in the mornings, or even once in a while when Charles is just brushing his teeth in the evening and getting ready for bed: that shining beam of Erik's desire for him, _stay, be here with me always_.

_I want that_. He has to be honest with himself. Leaving aside the money and convenience and the logic, he wants to move in because he hates spending time apart from Erik. Despite the fact that they need their space sometimes, and they certainly don't spend every waking minute in each other's pockets, he wants to know there's always a space for him within Erik's space at the end of the day – that it can become _his_ space too.

But.

Charles laughs bitterly. There's always a but.

It's a race between how much he wants to move in with Erik and how much that possibility frightens him. Unhappily, he lets his mind range over his apartment, through spaces he's memorized down to the last dusty, cracked-drywall inch so that he can navigate them in the dark. He'd had to last year during the storms, without power for three days. It's _his_ place, absolutely his – well, leaving aside the fact that he pays rent for it – a space he owns with his own money and hard work. Everything in it, cheap and disposable as it might be, is his too, from the books to the Salvation Army sofa to the dinette set he scavenged off Craigslist.

And it's not only the furniture or the space, it's what they represent. Independence. Control. The things he's fought so long and hard for. Erik respects that need – it's why he hasn't pressed the issue of moving in – and Charles... Charles hasn't figured out how to stop needing them. Given the events of today, when he's still off-balance and trying hard to fight against his old instincts, stung despite himself by Russo's rejection and then by Erik's, he figures he has a ways to go before he learns how to give some of his control and independence up.

His phone chimes at him, once, twice, and on the third time it sounds downright irritated that Charles hasn't answered it promptly.

Erik. Charles sighs. _Speak of the devil._

He doesn't really feel like talking right now, but he can't just ignore it; Erik will just worry, and call back again and again until Charles _does_ answer – or, even worse, show up on Charles's doorstep, ready to fight whatever battle needs to be fought, and to be annoyed when there's nothing but Charles's laziness.

He picks up his phone. "Hey."

"Hey." Erik's voice is rough, cracked. He sounds tired, like he's been talking nonstop since the last time Charles saw him. Something in Charles's chest softens a little, just hearing his voice. "You okay?"

"Me?" Charles says. "I'm fine."

"Are you mad at me?" Erik says. There's the sound of the TV in the background, barely audible reruns of the Daily Show. Charles can see Erik in his mind – probably still in his suit, only the jacket carefully hung up on the hall tree, sitting on the couch with his legs wide apart, sore feet in his trouser socks. If Charles was there he would be sitting next to him; he could push Erik to lie down, take Erik's feet into his lap and rub them until Erik lets out that low moan that's pain and relief both.

"I'm not mad," Charles tells him. He sits up, folding his legs underneath him until he's sitting criss-cross on the cushion, like a kindergartener. 

The sound Erik makes over the phone line could be a sigh. "Don't say that if you are."

"I'm not."

"I was busy earlier. It wasn't a good time. I wasn't blowing you off – "

"I'm not angry, Erik," Charles says with more snap in his voice than is probably wise. In truth, he _is_ angry, not for Erik telling him to go away, but for Erik's assumption that Charles had wanted – had needed – something beyond just checking to make sure Erik was okay. Out loud, he says, "I'm just tired. This wasn't a good day for me either, you know."

"I know," Erik says softly. "I'm sorry about that."

Charles steels his resolve as best he can; Erik like this, quiet and regretful, is more dangerous than when the fuse of his temper is about to burn down to the end. He's always known how to deal with Erik's temper. His empathy is another question. It offers itself like Erik's body does, something warm and reliable Charles can curl into and allow to shelter him.

"It's been a really long day," he says as firmly as he can. "And I just... I need some space to work through what happened with Evelyn Russo." What he means is that this is something Erik can't understand fully, despite his love of Charles's mutation. Erik makes a quietly frustrated noise, but it also sounds like agreement; he knows Charles doesn't want a lecture on his behalf tonight. "Look, I might get out of my head for a while tonight. I need to think it over and I'll... I'll see you tomorrow, I guess?"

"Yeah," Erik says, "okay. Goodnight, Charles. I love you."

"I love you, too," Charles says. Sometimes it still startles him how easy it is to say, even like this, when they're not having sex, not even touching; still, there's not the slightest hesitation, nothing holding him back. It's simply a truth of the world, a universal constant. He loves Erik. "Good night."

After he hangs up the phone, he gets off the couch and heads to the kitchen. He doesn't have much food in the cabinet, but there are a couple of cans of soup hanging about, so he heats some up, staring down at the particles of salt and oil emulsing in the water. While he stands over the stove, stirring, he thinks about going away and out of his head. As tempting as it is, it's probably not a good idea, not when he has work in the morning. Maybe at some point he'll have more control over it, but for now, he still can't tell for sure how long he'll be gone when he starts. 

He's sitting down at the table with his bowl when it occurs to him to wonder whether it would make a difference to have another telepath watching over him. Would they be able to sense what was happening, help him control it? He's never let anyone but Erik see him like that – in some ways it's the ultimate in vulnerability – and he's not ready to let anyone else in like that right now. But some day, maybe, if he and Jean get closer... It's something to think about.

Tonight, though, without that as an option, Charles has to find something else to distract him. His instinct is stupid sitcoms, or a shitty horror movie, something brainless and vapid – but as soon as he thinks of it, the realization follows that his laptop is still at Erik's. He has a TV here, but no cable, and the VCR has been broken for months. 

A book, then. Charles collects his soup, the most mindless book he can find – one of Erik's, actually, a pulp science fiction novel with a ratty, crumbling cover – and his fleece throw, and folds himself into a corner of his couch. Propping the book open with his elbow is a bit awkward, but worth it. The prose, terrible as it is, carries him along with it as he eats, and the hot soup and warm blanket take away most of the chill that's gotten stuck underneath his skin.

* * *

He wakes up rested, but imperfectly so. His bed doesn't seem right with only himself in it, and with the window on the wrong wall – to the right of his bed instead of the left. No Erik, though, that's the big difference; the mattress seems too big with only Charles taking up space on it. At least, Charles thinks as he drags himself out from under the covers and into the air of his underheated bedroom, he doesn't have an excuse to linger – although he also doesn't have Erik chivvying him to get up and out so they can be ten minutes early for work.

Another thing that frightens and warms him: how his mornings have shaped themselves to Erik. He's used to fighting for space at the sink, at the counter while he makes his tea and Erik pours his first cup of coffee and dumps the rest into a travel mug. He's used to a quick, last-minute kiss that tastes like Erik's toothpaste and smells like his aftershave. To not have it... Charles remembers, of course, months and years of solitude, but the clarity of those memories only reminds him how much he doesn't want to go back to them.

Getting ready on the subway's timetable is also strange for the moment Charles needs to snap back into his old routine. He has a half-hour to make the train that will get him to the precinct with two minutes to spare, enough time to shower and scrounge clean clothes – most of his are over at Erik's, of course – and make his oatmeal. Fortunately his routine goes like clockwork, and he's on the platform three minutes before the train's light appears in the darkness of the tunnel.

Erik's another light, brilliant and sparking, in the hum of bodies and minds around the precinct. He's standing there by the huge double doors, waiting, his grey eyes fixed attentively on Charles, his mind leaping out in welcome and relief although his face betrays none of it.

_Hey_ , Charles sends, and risks a small smile.

_Good morning_ , Erik responds. He doesn't smile, but there's a warmth to his thoughts, steady and strong. Up close, he looks tired, and he hasn't shaved today, either, which is unusual for a work day. At least his clothes are, as ever, immaculate.

Erik notices Charles noticing, of course, and as they walk into the building he says, _I was up late last night seeing about calling in a favor from Mutant Legal Aid_ – Charles can't help a spark of doubt and surprise at that; he can't imagine why they would take on Russo's case, just because she happens to be a mutant, but Erik ignores his start and goes on – _and I didn't sleep too well after that._

He doesn't elaborate beyond that, but Charles has a strong suspicion that translates into bad dreams. He feels guilty for a moment, though he knows it's stupid – he's not Erik's caretaker, his scourge against nightmares, and Erik neither needs nor wants him to be. Hell, if Erik had his way, Charles wouldn't even know about his dreams. 

_I didn't sleep that great, either_ , Charles offers, almost shyly. If they weren't at work, he'd kiss Erik, or at least take his hand; somehow it's always been easier to reconnect and reassure Erik bodily than it has with words or even sometimes thoughts. But they're at work now, and there are rules to follow.

_We'll have to make up for that tonight_ , Erik says. It's sly and teasing, or as close to it as Erik gets at work. A few images sneak in along with it, ones that don't have the innuendo Charles might otherwise expect, memories of Erik waking up with Charles sleep-soft and pressed close to him, thinking how much better he sleeps when Charles is in his bed. They disperse quickly as Erik turns his thoughts to the day ahead, but the warmth remains.

Charles is glad of it. The entire precinct knows about Russo's arrest. Some of the cops and detectives are happy another mutant's off the streets, and are even happier that it was two mutants responsible for getting her off; that way, they don't have to put up with the mutant community's whining about persecution and discrimination. He's relieved Erik can't hear those thoughts, although he's pretty sure Erik knows people think them anyway. The other mutants who are here – Alex, Ororo, Angel, and Logan; Emma's chronically late – all offer nothing, too used to Erik's hostility when faced with sympathy and too caught up in their own _what-ifs_ , wondering what the fallout is going to be.

Charles tries to tune out the thoughts as best he can, but it's like trying to ignore a miasma, knowing that poison is creeping in along with the stench. He tells himself that it's not _every_ human thinking they're glad Lehnsherr the shark and his telepathic freak partner are the ones who brought that mutie in. Really, it's only a few, although some others have thoughts along those lines and immediately feel bad for them ( _Xavier's a good kid, nice – don't judge them all by the actions of one, judge not lest ye be judged…_ ), and the ones who don't repent are the ones who, as Erik would say, are too stupid to matter.

They work through the morning, only pausing once for coffee and once more when Erik's phone rings. "Lehnsherr," Erik says brusquely into the phone after the second ring.

A pause, then Erik's thoughts pulse wildly with agitation and fury before he can get them under control; Charles pretends not to have seen that moment of vulnerability and stares fixedly at his computer screen, holding himself carefully apart from Erik, anything to keep out of the maelstrom of anger that's threatening to drag him down.

"No, I don't know who thought to call the Mutant Legal Association," Erik says evenly. "Yeah, I've heard Blaire's a good attorney... Last I checked, we're all entitled to representation – even mutants. We even get to have our Miranda rights read to us too. No, I'm not going to offer a damn comment. You can talk to the prosecutor, if she has time for you."

Great, it's the press. It was only a matter of time, Charles tells himself. He wonders how word got out, who must have been hovering like a vulture, waiting to start picking Evelyn Russo apart. 

Erik doesn't curse the guy out, hang up or slam down the phone, a self-restraint that Charles is pretty sure can be put down to the years Moira's had to work on him. His face is taut as the call ends and he sets his phone back down on the desk, glaring at it like an unwelcome pest.

"Taking a smoke break," Erik says. He grabs the cup of screws and nails from his drawer, along with the pack of cigarettes he still keeps there – Charles has him off of them entirely outside of work, but there's always some here, for emergencies or, well, situations exactly like this. Charles lets him go in silence, then sighs and gets up himself to head to the breakroom.

The room's almost empty, a woman he doesn't know doing Sudoku in one corner, a guy eating a salad in another. Charles buys himself a candy bar and a can of soda out of the vending machines and sits down.

The story will be on the local news by tonight, surely. Charles wonders what it would take to convince Erik not to watch. Not that it matters much; by tomorrow it'll have spread even wider. They'd have to be in an isolation chamber to avoid it, or something close. 

_That_ thought makes him smile, remembering last summer, the two of them on vacation together, the tiny cottage they rented up on the shore in Maine. No TV, no internet, and Charles had made Moira promise no phone calls from her, or anyone from work, and even then Charles had to take Erik's phone away from him and store it away in the luggage. It had been a whole week where nothing else in the world existed except the two of them. The closest he's seen Erik to relaxed and content, maybe ever. 

He indulges himself for a few minutes, spinning out a few memories so vividly he's nearly reliving them, only the tether of stale, recycled air and the Sudoku player's concentration to anchor him to the present. Erik picking him up and marching them both into the frigid Atlantic, laughing as Charles struggled and cursed him. Lazy mornings in bed with the salt-smell in the air and the waves crashing. They're the kind of pictures tourist bureaus put in their ads and brochures, like the memory of a cool evening drowsing against Erik's shoulder while Erik drank a last glass of wine, a large blanket thrown over both of them.

And the _silence_ , especially at night. Boston had been only a distant hum away down south, easily ignored. The minds of the few people in the cottages and beach houses scattered on the coast had been like isolate fireflies, pretty but only part of the surroundings. For once Charles hadn't had to spare any attention or energy to keeping up his shields or pretending millions of other minds didn't exist; he'd been able to give all of himself to Erik.

Selfishly, he wants that back. It occurs to him he _could_ , in some parallel universe where Erik would agree to being Charles's kept man. He has to laugh thinking about that, which gets him a spike of confusion from the salad-eater and annoyance from the Sudoku player. Thinking about the reporter on the other end of the phone dulls his amusement, the knowledge there's going to be fallout from this.

Erik's going to have to cope with that fallout, which means Charles is too. With a sigh, Charles tosses his candy wrapper in the trash and his soda can in the recycling and heads back out. The storm down in the smoking area has died, Erik piecing his calm back together as he reassembles his scrap metal, and it's time to get back to work.

The rest of the day seems to pass unusually slowly, the minutes clicking by agonizingly. Charles thinks at first that the headache he's getting is from the stirred emotions of nearly everyone around him, only to realize later that it's more likely due to the fact he's been grinding his teeth together all afternoon. As for Erik, he seems to be working solely on fury and caffeine. None of his exhaustion shows on the outside, but Charles figures he's going to collapse as soon as they get home and he no longer has his work to keep him going.

Charles is as wrong about that as he is about his headache, as it turns out. It's obvious as soon as they make it inside Erik's apartment. Erik can't sit down, or keep still; there's a weird, manic energy to him, a twitchiness that contrasts deeply with his normal self-possession. Charles starts to get together leftovers to heat up for dinner, but he gives it up after a few minutes of watching Erik wander around the apartment, poking at his possessions.

Charles isn't that hungry, anyway.

It's like a puzzle, with oddly high stakes. Trying to figure out what Erik needs, when Erik doesn't even know. When Charles barely knows how to take care of himself.

"Come sit down on the couch," Charles says, finally. 

Erik gives him a funny look, as if he'd almost forgotten Charles was still there, but he does what Charles asks, nonetheless. Charles doesn't entirely know why he's obeying – Erik like this doesn't listen to anyone, and can be decidedly mulish when Charles decides to press his authority – but Erik does, folding himself into the couch obediently, if grudgingly.

Charles comes to stand behind him, leaning over to grip and begin to massage the tense, tight muscles of Erik's shoulders and upper back. Every bit of frustration over the past several months, every bit of anxiety over Evelyn Russo's fate, is knotted up under Erik's dress shirt and his skin.

Erik doesn't want to be soothed, that much is clear, but he also doesn't want to hurt Charles by pulling away. So he submits, reluctantly at first, then more fully. In the absence of being able to talk about Erik's upset – Erik enjoys making Charles talk about his issues, less so when Charles makes him talk about his – it's easier, at least to offer care by touch and silence. He's always known that being close to Erik would mean being caught in the crossfire of Erik's own anger and darkness. Erik's never learned to soften his rough edges for anyone, although Charles knows he's trying to learn, now.

Finally, finally, the worst of the tension loosens. Erik lets out a shaky breath and leans back a bit, pushing into Charles's hands as he rubs and presses. Charles lets his own mind rest as open as he can make it giving the grinding ache that's taken up residence in his temples and behind his eyes. He doesn't push any of his thoughts or feelings at Erik, unsure of how welcome they'd be, only establishing his presence as something Erik can lean on if he wants, a wall made up of simply being there. 

Not only is it a puzzle, it's a balancing act, wobbling between too much and too little and not knowing how far the fall is. 

Charles runs his palms up the broad span of Erik's shoulder blades, following the curve of muscle up to his neck and the auburn hair brushing at his nape. Erik had cut it in the early fall despite Charles's protests, _what am I going to hold on to?_ , but it's already starting to curl a little when Erik hasn't got it disciplined with brush and hair gel. A few more circles with his fingers and one more knot dissipates. He pauses then, feeling out the difference between tied-up muscle and muscle when it's supple and responsive, wondering how much more Erik's willing to tolerate; he's not entirely sure if he wants to look.

"That feels better," Erik says, his voice a little slurred. He raises one hand, bringing it up to rest on top of Charles's, holding him still. "Thank you."

Charles leans over and, daringly, kisses to the top of Erik's head.

"I was thinking earlier," he says. "About our trip, last summer." Erik makes a low rumbling sound, affirmation and interrogation in one. "It was a good time. We should do that again sometime, don't you think? February, maybe, or March." It sounds more reasonable to Charles's ears than what he really wants to say right now, which is _Let's run away together, right now, and never come back. A deserted island, maybe. I bet my trust fund could cover an island._

"Mm," Erik says, and for the first time since the phone call at work, Charles can feel the hint of a smile in his thoughts. He pulls Charles's hand down to his mouth, kissing the knuckles. _A week of having you all to myself?_ he sends. _How could I say no to that?_

In Charles's experience, Erik is good at saying no to anything and everything, arguing for the sake of arguing. Just another way they make such a good match, really.

Erik lets his hand drop, then, and reluctantly, Charles pulls himself away. Erik seems calmer now, so perhaps – this time, at least – Charles figured out the right move to make. He returns to the kitchen and the food still on the counter, making himself up a plate to heat in the microwave.

Erik turns on the TV while the timer's still going. The national news is on, talking about protests overseas and the price of gas. "I'm going to eat in the bedroom," Charles says, grabbing his dinner as soon as it's ready, along with his laptop from the coffee table.

He can hear Erik struggling not to remind Charles to clean up and not get crumbs or sauce on the comforters, and decides it's best to let that struggle go unacknowledged. Instead of saying what he wants to say, Erik says, "I'll be in in a bit."

"There's Indian, and you have some of your nuclear basil stir-fry left." Charles hesitates, his laptop tucked awkwardly under one arm and his plate balanced on his palm. "I can heat something up for you, if you want."

"I'm fine." While Charles thinks he does a good job of not thinking _oh for god's sake_ loud enough to be heard, some of it must show on his face because Erik smiles wryly, as if embarrassed. "I'll eat later, Charles."

"See that you do, Lehnsherr," Charles snaps. He means it half-seriously, half in play, and hopes Erik catches both meanings.

Erik must, because a quiet hum of contentment builds for a moment until it dissipates once the news begins again. At least it doesn't sound like Evelyn Russo's made national headlines yet. If she does. Maybe, in a world so torn up and shredding itself more finely day by day, one mutant will be insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Charles knows he shouldn't think like this, but he's grateful – selfishly grateful – that he can flick through his email (carefully ignoring an e-mail reminder about his lease) and watch something ridiculous on streaming, try to calm the headache and shed the rest of the day.

The headache steadfastly refuses to budge, not for the food and not for the hot shower Charles takes. Wearily, Charles stumbles into his pajamas and dims the lights, shuts the laptop and slides it under the table. At the last second he remembers the plate and glass, still on his bedside table. It seems like an impossibly long trek around the corner, through the living room, and into the kitchen, but he figures he has to make it.

When he steps into the living room, he winces against the brightness, his vision blurring a little. The noise from the TV is nonsensical, but doesn't seem to be angering Erik. If anything, he's as peaceful as he's been all evening. Contained might be a better word. Still, Charles steps carefully around him, not wanting to disturb.

It doesn't work, of course; Erik is ever too vigilant of his surroundings to allow that. Instead of stiffening up, though, he merely twists around in his seat to look at Charles with a soft, serious expression. "Hey, baby. You coming to drag me to bed?"

Charles shakes his head. "Just taking care of the dirty dishes." He rinses them off in the sink and puts them directly into the dishwasher, noticing with a little satisfaction that there's a bowl in there from Erik's dinner as well. When he turns back around, Erik's still watching him. 

"Go back to your show," Charles says, nodding toward the TV. "I'm fine."

Erik shrugs. "It's nothing important." He grabs the remote from the arm of the couch, clicking the TV off and rising to stand in one fluid motion. "Go back to bed. I'll join you in just a minute."

Charles has to pass by Erik again to leave the living room, and he stops in front of him, going up on his toes to snatch a kiss. Erik's arms come around him, steadying rather than tight, warm against Charles's back even through the thick flannel of his pajamas. It's a lazy kiss, soft and undemanding, and Charles sighs as he lets it end and steps away again.

The darkness of the bedroom is a relief after the bright light of the main room. Charles slips back into the bed and the warmth of the sheets. He can hear water running in the bathroom as Erik goes through his nightly rituals.

A few minutes later, Erik slides into bed. He always moves carefully, quietly, whenever he thinks Charles is asleep or needs peace and quiet, as if Charles weren't more or less permanently attuned to every movement he makes. It's familiar, though, every step in Erik's routine as known as a dance, including this part: Erik lightly setting a hand on Charles's waist, the pressure barely felt at first but growing firmer.

_'M not asleep_ , Charles says, though he's been drifting that way. Some of his own tension loosens when he allows himself to turn over, drawn by Erik's gravity into his arms. He gets his own arm around Erik's waist even as he tucks his head under Erik's chin. From there the next step in the dance is for Erik to roll onto his back, tugging Charles along with him so Charles is folded close with his cheek resting on the firm support of Erik's chest and Erik can turn his head to nuzzle and sigh against Charles's temple.

_You feel tense_. The fingers stroking Charles's shoulder drift upward, tracing gently across Charles's temple. Charles shivers and sighs. _Telepathy headache?_

Charles doesn't get them often, only when he's pushed himself or the chaos at the precinct is so intense he spends the entire day frantically rebuilding shields like throwing sandbags at a failing levee. This is different, though; he sends a wordless negation, and then, _just a rough day. This is nice, though. It helps._

"Mm," Erik says. He continues the caress, and Charles lets himself melt into it, the comfort and tenderness.

Arousal, too, his body responding to Erik's just like always. It's been – Charles counts back in his head – five days since they last had sex. While that's not a long time in the context of most things, it might be the longest they've gone since their relationship began. Charles isn't completely sure, for that matter, exactly how long it's been since he masturbated. Long enough. Of course he's going to get hard, here surrounded by Erik's skin, his smell, his mind. 

Still, though, it's a distant feeling, like he's aware of it without really living it. He doesn't have any wish to act on it right now, any more than he wants to talk with Erik, or get out of bed, or do anything at all except lie here close and quiet in this bubble, drifting off to the faint pressure of Erik's touch.


	2. Chapter two

Charles wakes up before the alarm. Erik's already up, though his side of the bed is still warm as Charles moves to the center of the mattress. He stretches his mind out a little and finds Erik just where he expects to, out on his run, pushing himself hard enough that it takes up his full concentration. It's nasty outside, drizzling and still dark, and Charles spares a moment of condescending pity for Erik as he snuggles back into the blankets and pillows.

He lets himself drowse, mind lacing lazily in and out of consciousness, until he feels Erik's thoughts turn homeward. Reluctantly, because Erik's bed really is the most comfortable thing, he drags himself out into the cool bedroom air, sheds his pajamas one step at a time on his way to the shower. Showering now gives him enough time to enjoy the spill of hot water – Charles is a little bemused by his newfound hedonism – and not have to hurry through shaving and brushing his teeth, or folding his sleep clothes and putting them away before Erik gets tetchy.

Everything about this morning is familiar. Charles pauses as he catches sight of himself in the bureau mirror, with his shirt half buttoned up and his hair still a damp, messy tumble. He stares at the boy in the mirror, who examines him in turn with his serious blue eyes. The boy in the mirror is content, like Charles is, without the wariness and tiredness Charles is so used to seeing. He looks like he belongs here, with his own few drawers in the dresser and space in the bathroom for toothbrush and razor. Not a guest, not someone passing through.

A few minutes later Erik comes in, just as Charles finishes tying his shoes. He's sweaty and flushed, and unfairly magnificent, Charles thinks, as he strips off his running jacket and shirt, baring the long, slender line of his torso and his wide shoulders. Erik shoots him a look over one of those shoulders – he knows, of course, what this does to Charles – and Charles sends him a disgruntled _If I knew it wouldn't make us late for work, I'd be all over you right now._

"Jesus, Charles," Erik groans. It's more teasing than put-upon. _Monster._

_I know_ , Charles says sweetly. _I'll start your coffee._

"Hey," Erik says. He stops in the doorway, preventing Charles from leaving – he's usually pretty careful of that, of blocking Charles in physically, but he doesn't look aware of it this time. He looks thoughtful, and his eyes are soft enough to distract Charles from his still-naked chest. "Come here."

"You're going to make me disgusting," Charles grumbles, but he comes close anyway. Erik doesn't pull him in tight, presumably in deference to Charles's concerns, but he does take one of Charles's hands in his, and strokes at Charles's damp hair with his other. 

"It's been rough lately," Erik says. "I know I'm not the easiest person to deal with." He ignores Charles's _oh really? I hadn't noticed_ and goes on. "But it's almost the weekend, and I promise, we can put everything else away. Just the two of us, whatever you want."

Something complicated and painful is choking up Charles's throat. He's not sure that he even believes that Erik can put anything away that long – not to even address the point of whether he _should_ – but the fact that Erik's willing to try and offer it is astonishing. "What if I want to go see the tree at Rockefeller Center?" Charles says. "Or go shopping midtown?"

Erik makes a face, one that de-ages him a good ten years, and makes Charles smile. "Anything you want," he repeats, in a put-upon voice. "Though I was hoping for something a little more homebound."

"We can do that, too," Charles says. He tilts up a little to press a kiss to Erik's mouth, and to press a few images of ways to spend tonight, or a raw, chilly Sunday, the two of them wrapped around and totally absorbed in each other. Erik takes the kiss briefly deeper before pulling away reluctantly, and Charles grins. "I know you're a curmudgeon in your old age, but I do love all the holiday stuff."

"I wouldn't have figured you for the holiday type," Erik admits. He vanishes back into the bathroom again, a haze of bemused affection drifting along with the steam.

"I wouldn't have, either," Charles says, following him in. He boosts himself up on the bathroom counter, watching appreciatively as Erik skins out of his running pants and compression shorts. Once Erik's distracting body is, mostly, just a blurry suggestion behind the shower door, he says, "But there's something about it. I don't know. People are stressed and busy, and it's so chaotic, but there's anticipation, ritual, excitement..."

"Materialism," Erik shouts over the thunder of water.

_Grinch_ , Charles thinks back. It wins him a laugh and a sense of contentment from Erik, a warmth and love for Charles's paradoxical mind. It also gets him a kiss once Erik steps out of the shower, one that's more laughter than actual kissing as Charles pushes Erik's wet hair off his forehead, until he's got Erik's hair the way he likes it and they can kiss properly. 

It's too short before Erik pulls away, but they are on a limited timeline, after all – and with the promise of more later, it's a little easier to let go. Charles scoots down the counter a little, giving Erik better access to the steamed-up mirror. 

Watching Erik shave is always a treat; usually Charles is too involved in his own morning tasks to have time to just let himself sit and watch. He doesn't think he'll ever get tired of watching Erik use his ability, whether it's stretching out his power to its limits or performing something utterly mundane. And even beyond that wonder, there's something unexpectedly thrilling about watching the metal slicing across Erik's skin, exposing the perfect lines of his jaw to view once more. 

When Erik's done, he heads back to the bedroom to dress, and Charles does, finally, go and start his coffee. There's a silver menorah sitting atop the counter, and Charles eyes it with some curiosity. Presumably Erik got out of storage last night, when Charles was still in the bedroom; Charles must not have noticed it when he came out, blurry and dazed as he was. 

He calls up the memory of the calendar page in his head and confirms that, yes, tonight is the first night of Hanukkah. That answers the obvious question, but still leaves more. Apart from the half-nod he gives towards keeping a somewhat kosher kitchen, Erik isn't at all observant religiously. Jean's roommate _is_ , and most of what Charles does know about Judaism he's picked up from sitting around her dorm room listening to her, but he's under the impression that Hanukkah is a pretty minor holiday.

Maybe Erik likes the silver of the menorah and keeps it for that. Charles, of course, doesn't have anything like Erik's eye or feeling for metal, but the candelabrum has the dull gleam of very old silver that's still been well-kept and cared for. Charles imagines Erik using his abilities to remove the tarnish, picking wax away with his fingernail. Old, Charles thinks, of course; it must be the menorah he and his mother had, the ritual of lighting the candles every night.

There's no time to ask Erik about it, and he knows that the depth of Erik's love for his mother is matched by his need to keep these kinds of discussions to spaces outside of work. He'll have to ask tonight, when they get back home. Evening is the time for confidences, Charles has found, when Erik feels like he has the time and space to work through his memories. Having the memory he does Charles doesn't quite understand that, but he knows how tightly, how desperately Erik clings to what he remembers of his mother and their life together.

Eventually Erik comes out, neatly suited and tied, his hair brushed. Charles hands over the coffee cup and Erik takes it, downing half of it before kissing Charles briefly and sweetly, the last kiss before they start their day.

* * *

Charles had, stupidly, half-thought the day would be quiet to match the soft start of the morning. He curses that, and his being caught off-guard, when he realizes, too late, there's a reporter bearing down on him.

"Charles Xavier?" she calls. Her red, curly hair bounces behind her as she charges up to him in a flurry of green coat. She knows who he is, of course; he can tell that immediately. He can also tell he doesn't want to talk to her. There's no way to shake her without using his abilities – strongly frowned upon when he's acting as a representative of the department – or being rude, and while Charles is caught between those two useless options, she has him corralled.

"Can you comment on yesterday's arrest of Evelyn Russo?" she asks, thrusting a tiny recorder at his face. "What role did your telepathy play in it?"

"I'm sorry," Charles says, "I can't really speak on the case. You'll want to direct any inquiries to the press relations office–" His hands are full, carrying the coffees he'd volunteered to run out for during a lull in the morning's work. Erik might still have plenty to do, but most of Charles's consulting responsibilities are focused on the earlier stages of the case; once they have a suspect in custody, the already limited amount he can use his powers is even more restricted. He'd figured a Starbucks run would give him some fresh air, if nothing else.

The reporter smiles, wide, teeth bared and cutting. "Well, then, can you talk to me about how you got involved with the police department? It seems like an unusual choice for the heir to a multi-million dollar fortune. Does it have to do with why you dropped out of school?"

Charles glares at her. He's suddenly acutely aware of the messiness of his hair, the tiny hole near the hem of his thick green sweater, the faded Converse on his feet – the entire general poor clueless young kid impression he must be giving off. He hates himself a little for even caring. He says again, in his most controlled voice, playing up the poshness that drives Erik crazy, "I'm sorry, I can't help you. If you'll excuse me, I need to get back to work."

It doesn't get rid of her, of course, but he keeps his head ducked down, walking as quickly as he can back to the building, and she can't follow him in. He ducks into the first bathroom he sees, setting the coffees down hard on the counter and sucking in a deep breath.

He's never had to deal with the press before. Before, he thinks sarcastically, he'd been careful enough to steer clear of where he knows they are or will be. Some of them are simply trying to do their jobs and report, but others – like the reporter just now – circle like vultures, preying on tragedy. In the absence of having Evelyn Russo to pick at, she's chosen _him_. And worse, she knows who he is. What he is.

_It was only a matter of time_. The world was going to find out sooner or later. He wonders how this particular reporter managed it. Wanting to know about his past, something completely immaterial to the case, suggests she's not really interested in Russo, or the problems mutants encounter in the justice system, but in _him_ , in the past no one but Erik gets to hear about. Even though he's gotten rid of her, he can't help but want to draw into himself, curling protectively around the truth of what he is.

As if summoned, Erik appears in the bathroom a few minutes later. He's a bit ragged at the edges, trailing frustration – not with Charles, with the endless calls from journalists and bloggers, trying to advocate for Russo however he can. Of course, it doesn't take him long at all to add up the parts of the picture Charles makes, drawn miserable and tense, wary again like he'd been back in the beginning of their acquaintance. 

"What's up?" Erik asks. He gestures to his temple. "I felt something going on up here."

"I'm sorry," Charles breathes. "I didn't mean to project. Just got caught off-guard by a reporter." He manages a smile that doesn't feel entirely truthful. "It wasn't as nice as the last time I got caught off-guard and a nice cop let me get away with underage drinking."

"Nice," Erik repeats. "That's a new one for me, I think."

He comes closer, approaching in that utterly careful way that Charles hates, that makes him feel like he's being handled with kid gloves. Erik doesn't touch him, of course (rules, always the same stupid _rules_ , over and over), though he comes close enough to. Instead he leans back against the counter, arms folded across his chest, and frowns.

Charles picks up his coffee, closes his eyes and swallows down half of his now-lukewarm vanilla latte in one gulp. He tries to concentrate on the physical sensations, the mix of sweet and bitter on his tongue. It's easy for him to get caught inside his mind, in the infinite loop of his own thoughts, and he thinks he's in danger of that now, stuck in the swarm of memories of his childhood and past and shame. Sometimes it helps to find something to cling to that's completely outside himself. He'd prefer sex, honestly, but this will do in a pinch.

"What was different about this one?" Erik says, still frowning. It's not as if Charles hasn't come across the media before, in the months they've been working together; of course Erik would wonder why his reaction is so much stronger this time. "You look..." He trails off without finishing. 

Charles rubs his nose with the back of his hand. It's red in the mirror, along with his cheeks. Between that and his eyes, he looks like a porcelain doll on the shelf, or an elf in Santa's lab. He scowls at himself. " It was... she didn't just want to know about the case. She got personal."

There it is: he can feel Erik's anger rising up in his chest, consistent and predictable as the tides or the sunrise. All Erik says aloud is, "Ah."

"She just surprised me," Charles says. It wasn't only her, of course. It was her questions, how swiftly his family and past have rushed back in to inundate him. "And it... it got to me, being ambushed like that."

He can tell Erik's a hairsbreadth from telling Charles to give him the reporter's description so he can go and sink the fear of Erik Lehnsherr into her should she ever accost Charles again. The protectiveness warms him with affection and annoyance both at once, affection because this is so _Erik_ , annoyance because Charles can, in fact, fight his own battles. He strokes soothingly across the surface of Erik's thoughts. "I know my consultancy means I can't speak about any of the cases I work on," he says, "but when people start to make connections, the rich kid moonlighting in the NYPD because he dropped out of school..." He swallows. "I could damage the integrity of the work we're doing."

"You won't damage a thing," Erik says fiercely. He straightens to his full height, which no longer intimidates Charles; still, in his mind's eye, Charles can see Erik staring down whatever's in his way, whatever might seek to do Charles harm. "In case you haven't noticed, Moira's good at managing fallout. _If_ there's any fallout," he adds. One of the reasons Moira's captain in a mutant-heavy detail is her ability to put a good human face on baseline uncertainties about mutants in the justice system. Erik raises a hand, half-reaching for Charles, before he drops it. "We've closed six cases since we've worked together. They might have gone unsolved otherwise – or," because this is Erik, of course, " – would have needed longer to solve. That outweighs anything that a bored tabloid reporter could dig up."

He'll have to convince himself of this, Charles thinks. For now, he wants to go home, or go away, or go back to work, anything but stay stuck in his head, where some stupid, impertinent question's put him.

"Yeah," Charles says instead of all the messily complicated things he wants to say. Those, he'll have to save for later. He picks up the other coffee and hands it to Erik. "Come on, let's get back to work."

Erik slips back into his groove almost immediately when they get back to his desk, but as hard as he tries to force himself to concentrate, Charles finds it a little more difficult to not let his mind wander. It comes as somewhat of a relief after lunch when Moira approaches to tell him he can head home.

"None of this is actually in your job description," she says, standing over the desk with a raised eyebrow. "You don't have to let Lehnsherr rope you into doing his work for him, you know. Go off and have a good weekend."

Charles surprises himself when he agrees to leave early, but not as much as he surprises Erik. The surprise is muted immediately, although underneath Erik's calculating out what this might mean. Charles has never left early before, has always stuck around to help with whatever paperwork he can after a case has been closed. Most days, Charles likes the sense of wrapping-up and seeing the case through to the final detail, but today he wants to get out… and Erik's mulling over what that might mean.

He gives Erik a small, private smile as he gathers his things together. "I'll see you at home tonight," he says, allowing himself a clandestine squeeze of Erik's hand where it lies atop the desk. "And I'm not going to forget about your promise from earlier."

Erik eyes him with a sort of confusion; the expression lies oddly on his face. "All right," he says. "I'll see you then."

Of course, that leaves what to do with the rest of his day, other than avoid reporters and the nagging thoughts about how, maybe, it's time to move on. Fortunately – and the thought stuns him, still, a little – he has friends. Not acquaintances or colleagues like in the department, or the people he meets and is friendly with, but _friends_. He runs through Scott's and Jean's schedules in his mind as he leaves the building. Jean has her art history class Friday afternoons, but Scott should be free. Charles pulls off his gloves to send a text.

Scott replies a few minutes later, and twenty minutes on, Charles is installed in a booth at a student-infested coffee shop, a much better latte warming his hands and Scott, after taking off his scarf and folding it carefully (and setting his gloves atop it), folding himself into the seat across the table.

"Jean might stop by, if she gets out of class on time," Scott says before Charles can even ask. He smiles, his usual reserved smile, although Charles can feel the teasing kind of sincerity that seems peculiar to Scott. "She has a girlcrush on her professor." He takes a sip of his own coffee, black, two sugars. That also is very Scott, few frills and no excitement. "So she'll either be here or talking about women in Renaissance iconography for the rest of the afternoon."

"I'm jealous," Charles admits. He misses those conversations, the few that he'd had before he'd dropped out. Charles continues, before he can wander down that particular path, "What have you been up to? I've been so busy."

"Heard about the case from Alex," Scott says, wincing. "But we're okay. Finals coming up. Jean's stressing, because she procrastinated on some research. I told her she should have set up a research plan when she got her assignments, but she didn't listen."

That's also typical of Scott, who is the only nineteen-year-old Charles has ever met who has a meticulously-organized calendar, and who makes a plan for his semester and sticks to it. He has it on authority from Jean that his sock drawer is color-coordinated, and he knows, without having to look very hard, that Scott's only agreed to meet him because this particular segment of the afternoon is designated relaxation time. Really, Charles doesn't quite understand why Erik doesn't like Scott much, given their mutual dedication to organization and structure. The next time Erik starts grumbling about Scott's fastidiousness, Charles should point that out – and, perhaps, suggest that their common love of cleanliness means Scott should be Erik's boyfriend, not Charles and his perpetual near-chaos.

Those are the same things that make being around Scott calming, though, the steady straight-forwardness of his mind a sort of soothing balm. Charles knows, of course, that Scott has his own fucked-up past, but Scott doesn't seem to carry it with him everywhere on his shoulders the way that Charles suspects _he_ does, the way Erik does, too. It's like he's too busy with his present – his studies, his girlfriend, his brother – to have time to focus on what's gone before. Charles is both bewildered and envious.

Their conversation is relaxing, too. Still a bit envious, Charles asks Scott about school, and in turn Scott asks about the books he's read recently, a blog they both follow online – pleasant, entertaining chatter with no hidden traps to look out for. Not everything is high stakes, Charles reminds himself, the end of the world or the other part of his soul. Sometimes things can just be ... nice, can just be coffee and filling time with talk. It's exactly what he needs today, after the incident with the reporter, the stress of work, the question of his lease still hanging over his head.

As much as he tries to concentrate on Scott, though, he can't drown out all the minds in the coffee shop. Most of them are innocuous – as Scott mentioned, it's almost time for finals, and there's more than one student panicking or making plans for that – but there are a few centered on Scott, too, curious or amused or wary of the dramatic thick red glasses that cover most of his face, that almost certainly brands him as a mutant to anyone who sees him. By extension, those minds are wondering about Charles, if he's a mutant too, and if so what can he do, or if he's human. If he's _like us_.

Nobody is explicitly aggressive or hateful right now, but it reminds Charles of one of the topics he's been trying to avoid: the lingering worry of the possible backlash against mutants if Evelyn Russo's story blows up. Even beyond being visible, Scott's power is exactly the kind that bigots like to point to when they scaremonger – violent, hard to control, with no obvious other uses than offense. Mutants argue constantly about passing for human – baseline, in the less-kind parlance of mutant politics – and Charles wonders if _he's_ choosing to pass, or is forced to, by reining in his telepathy the way he does.

He hates how his mind does this, circling back around to the things he'd rather just push to the side so he can enjoy his life. It's why he runs, in large part, trying desperately to leave all that darkness behind. Erik's been a safe place to run to, for all the danger he represents; Scott and Jean, he tells himself, could be another.

_Charles?_ It's Jean's voice, coming out of nowhere. Charles starts a little; he's still not used to anyone's voice in his head that _means_ to be there, other than Erik's. Jean laughs silently, a wordless apology. _I just got out of class. Are you and Scott still at – oh, you are! I can be there in ten minutes._

She has the same conversation with Scott, her abilities not yet fine-tuned enough to allow her projections to go unheard by other receptive telepaths. Charles marvels at it, how Scott accepts Jean's telepathy without any mistrust or hesitation – although, of course, they might have the same kind of arrangement he has with Erik. He can't express what a gift it's been, to have someone who not only gladly hears what Charles has to say, but reaches back in turn. While Erik has his prickly moments, Charles at least knows what it's like to have someone whose mind he can wrap up with his own, just to touch and know it's there, and feel the strong, steady pulse of Erik's affection.

Jean walks in the door, right on schedule, her red hair a beacon above the chaos of the rest of the coffee shop. She moves quickly through the battered chairs and their occupants, past the hipster-trendy decorations, and finally drops herself and her satchel into the booth next to Scott. After collecting a kiss from him, she smiles warmly at Charles, her mind brushing up against his in welcome.

"You seem tired," she says, wincing a little in sympathy. "Are you okay?"

Charles considers his answer before he speaks; it's not as though Jean's going to look through his thoughts, but they're open enough to each other that she'll be able to tell if he lies. That's another thing he's not used to having, from anyone but Erik: somebody who can call him on his bullshit, and will. Jean will do it nicely, but she'll still do it. "I am okay," Charles says finally. "Stressed out, but okay." He smiles at her. "Better now that you're here."

"I feel like I should mind more that you're always flirting with my girlfriend in front of me," Scott says thoughtfully, wrapping his arm around Jean's shoulder. 

Jean laughs as she snuggles in closer to him. "It's because we both know he doesn't mean anything by it. Charles doesn't know how to turn off the charm."

"It's true," Charles says solemnly. "I can't help myself, Scott. Jean's just too captivating."

It's impossible to tell behind the glasses, of course, but he suspects Scott is glaring.

Jean continues, with a mischievous glint in her eyes, "Besides, Charles is already taken. He has the mysterious older boyfriend waiting for him at home. Mr. Tall, Dark and Handsome, with the giant – "

"Argh!" Scott says, covering his ears. "Too much information!"

Charles can feel a blush rising up on his cheeks. While he's definitely comfortable with the though of being with Erik, and very accepting of Erik's aesthetics and physicality, having Jean right on the edge of pointing it out is a bit too much. Especially in public, and for some reason, especially in front of Scott.

"Sorry," Jean says, still laughing and not very repentant, "it's just you think about him _really loudly_ sometimes."

"You wouldn't find him so interesting if you'd actually met the guy," Scott tells her. "He's kind of a jerk. Um, no offense, Charles."

"Not to me," Charles responds with his most winsome look. Scott groans and rolls his eyes while Jean laughs. Charles lets his expression dissolve to wryness. "He isn't the.. easiest person to get along with," he says diplomatically.

"That's one way of putting it," Scott mutters. He yelps when Jean elbows him. "What? It's _true_."

"Be nice," Jean says reprovingly. "Charles wouldn't like him so much if he didn't see something in him."

She says it with a certainty Charles isn't used to hearing from other people – not just her own certainty, but his knowledge that she's right. People usually think they have his number, and they're wrong more often than not. Only Erik and Jean have really seen him for who he is. In some ways, Jean sees deeper; as a telepath, even a young one growing into her abilities; she has to know that Charles sees something in Erik worth keeping, something that ties them together. A year ago he might have feared someone having that knowledge, but now he finds he likes it.

"You won't have to worry about encountering him today," Charles says. "He's trying to finish up our case. I sort of... couldn't take it anymore. And there wasn't much for me to do, now that, well."

_You have a suspect in custody_ , Jean sends sympathetically. Charles nods as he takes a sip of his latte. "At least," Jean says, "maybe you'll have a break for a few days? You usually do."

"I'm dragging Erik downtown to do holiday things," Charles says, and pretends to ignore Scott's disbelieving splutters.

"Wow," Jean says. "I like being around people, but I'm not sure I could deal with the weekend holiday crowds."

_Erik will do it_ , Charles thinks but doesn't say, _because I asked him to_. He wonders what Erik wouldn't do, if he thought it would make Charles happy, and the idea leaves him a little breathless. His and Erik's relationship is still fundamentally private, though, and it feels wrong to let it be exposed, even here among friends, so he tucks it away for now. Instead he says, "He's lucky we were working through Thanksgiving. I didn't get a chance to force him to go to the parade."

Purely a joke – that's a crowd that would overwhelm even Charles, too many people too close overloading his telepathy – but he had been briefly disappointed on Thursday when he realized he'd missed the TV airing. 

The conversation moves on from there to holiday plans in general. Scott's going to be around, of course, but Jean is leaving almost immediately after finals to head back upstate to her family. The school Jean attends has a full month off between semesters, and as she talks Charles can feel the dull ache of Scott's worry about them being apart so long. He's not sure if Jean is able to sense it as well, but either way, Charles reminds himself it's not his place to reassure or comfort, especially since Scott's not even put words to his feelings.

That's the danger of having friends, Charles reflects. He's not used to it, having people close who you care about, and just want to be happy. He has to keep reminding himself of his boundaries, in a way he hasn't had to in years. 

Scott's phone rings, an obnoxious electronic riff that signals Alex is calling. He lights up, as visibly happy as someone who's so stoic can get, as he swipes a finger across the screen to answer it.

Their relationship is something Charles, who's only experienced brotherhood in the form of Cain, can't understand and envies and knows that the depth of love lying under Scott's surface exasperation is even deeper because of how many years they spent apart. Charles had only learned – well, had Alex tell him about it; he'd picked up that raw, still-open grief not long after meeting him – about how Scott had been one of the kids at a reparative institute for mutant children, torn away from Alex when they were little by the same foster system that Erik survived. Now Scott's conversation is everyday and not worth listening to, but Charles still finds himself caught by the _I'm talking to my brother_ that runs underneath Scott telling Alex about his day.

_You said you were stressed, earlier_ , Jean sends, her mental voice much clearer than the rumble of other voices in the coffee shop. _It was your case, wasn't it? And nothing... well, nothing else?_

At least she knows how Charles feels about Erik; she hadn't needed to put in the work Moira and some of their other friends have to accept the age difference between them. Still, her projection carries with it a faint hint of questioning that involves Erik, if things are okay with him. _It's just work_ , Charles reassures her. _We finished a case, and usually it's a good feeling when we solve it, but... but not this time._ He explains quickly about the mess with Evelyn Russo, and Jean grimaces, sending back a wave of understanding.

Then, steeling himself, because while Erik's support has been a gift, only another psionic can understand, _When we were questioning her... she kicked me out. Totally within her rights, of course, but..._ he takes a mental breath. _I'd been hoping it would be different, with a fellow mutant. I felt like I was going to drown in the waves of distrust she was giving off._

Jean's sympathy and empathy is warm and solid, the mental equivalent of a hug, and Charles lets himself melt into it a little, soak in the understanding and comfort. 

_My telekinesis didn't manifest until I was in middle school_ , Jean says, _and you know, I think, that it's just been the last year or two that the telepathy's really started. I'm not nearly as strong as you are –_

_That's going to change_ , Charles interrupts her. He can see, very obviously, the potential inside her; the power she carries, when she is able to access it, is going to be amazing. Besides himself and Erik, he's never seen its like.

Jean smiles at him and continues, _I still have to make an effort, though, is what I'm getting at. I have to open the door, if you see what I mean – yours is always open. I don't know how you ever get used to that fear or anger._

_You can get used to anything, with enough practice._ He doesn't let Jean see what lies behind those words, but he thinks she catches some of it anyway; those memories are too visceral for him to divorce them from any conversation having to do with telepathy and control.

Jean's quiet for a moment, watching him, her bright eyes fond and a little sad. _It sucks, Charles_ , she says finally. _I'm sorry. You don't deserve that. I mean, nobody does, obviously, but – you're a good person. I don't know how that's not obvious to everyone, mutant or not._

Charles doesn't _feel_ like a good person, most of the time, but he appreciates the sentiment, anyway. 

Scott is finishing up his call. He turns back to the two of them as he hangs up. "That was Alex. I should get home and start dinner. You guys want to come? It's taco night, so there's plenty."

"I'd love to," Jean says, which lights Scott up all over again. "I'm getting kind of tired of meal plan food. Are you coming, Charles?"

He's surprised at the twinge of regret he feels when he says, "No, I should get home... I abandoned Erik this afternoon, and we've barely seen each other in a non-work context since the case started." That, and he's kept tabs on Erik as he always does, and Erik's been nursing discontent underneath his focus. While Charles hasn't looked closely enough to determine its nature, he's sure some of it has to do with Charles leaving early – not that Charles has slacked off, but that Erik's day has shifted out from underneath his feet, forcing him to find his balance again. In turn, that feeds into the irritation Erik tries not to acknowledge at how necessary Charles has made himself, how he's gone and trampled all over Erik's boundaries without meaning to.

But, the regret he feels is nothing compared to what it's like when he thinks about tonight and the rest of the weekend, having Erik to himself. That buoys him up as he says goodbye to Scott and Jean, collecting a kiss on the cheek from her and a cordial handshake from Scott, and heads back across town in the frantic Friday rush. He wonders if he's projecting a little, or if it's just a good week for everyone else, the rest of the city looking forward to dinner and unwinding and whatever the weekend will bring.

He catches hold of Erik's thoughts a few blocks from the apartment. They're still frayed at the edges but settling a little, turning to concentrate on dinner rather than the day. When he reaches out and brushes a wisp of welcome across Erik's awareness, Erik responds with his usual quiet warmth, a pulse of something that's closer to contentment than he's been in a long time.

He finds himself walking faster, hurrying more and more the closer he gets to the building, until he's practically running the last few yards to the door. He passes one of Erik's neighbors in the entranceway, and gives her a wide smile as he holds the outside door open for her. She gives him an odd look, but smiles back, her politeness (or more likely, Charles projecting his happiness and anticipation) overcoming her innate suspicion. 

On the way up in the elevator, he leans against the wall, and thinks about the metal surrounding him and supporting him. It's a shame he's never managed to convince Erik to have sex with him here, really – but as willing as Erik is to go along with most of Charles's notions in the end, he does put his foot down about some things, and Charles can tell when it's not something he should push. Anything that hints at public sex is one of those: no elevators, no handjobs under the table at fancy restaurants, no matter how much Charles tells him he can make it so anyone can see, not even on the beach up in Maine, when Charles knew for a fact there was no one around for miles. He won't do anything he thinks will actually hurt Charles, either, no matter how much Charles begs, whether it's a little friendly choking during sex or playing with a paddle or cane. It took Charles _months_ to get him comfortable with the idea of spanking, though that's something they both enjoy now.

He spends most of the elevator ride looking at himself in the mirrored panels. Someday, he decides, he's going to look at himself and recognize what he sees. That kid there, the one who looks like he's doing okay, despite it all: that's Charles, not some stranger who'd sneaked into the elevator with him. He just has to let himself believe it.

_I'm home_ , Charles sends as the elevator beeps and the doors open to Erik's floor. The front door unlocks itself as soon as he gets the hand on the knob, and he lets himself in, heading straight to the kitchen, where he can hear the noises of Erik's cooking.

The sight that greets him is as familiar as if Charles has seen it all his life. Erik's in jeans and a hoodie, pouring two glasses of wine while the invisible hands of his ability wield a knife to chop peppers and toss onions and olive oil in a pan. He pauses to watch, and to soak in the soft, private smile Erik sends him.

"Hey," Charles says, moving more fully into the kitchen. "That smells wonderful."

"Nice to see you too," Erik rumbles. It isn't cranky, only teasing. He bends his head to kiss Charles and Charles gladly accepts it, tilting his own head up to meet Erik's mouth. It's a lazy, end-of-day kiss, and Charles can feel a bit more of Erik's tension unspool as Charles licks at him and takes them deeper, a kick of lust that makes him shudder. They haven't had sex for ages, practically; Charles will have to see if they can do anything about that tonight.

When they break apart, Charles takes up his usual station at the breakfast bar – "supervising," he calls it; Erik calls it 'being lazy" – and watches as Erik assembles a stir fry. His long fingers and broad palms cup piles of vegetables to transfer them to the wok, new scents to join the onions and garlic. Pointedly, Erik pulls the silverware drawer open and floats knives and forks over to Charles, who gets the hint and, with a sigh, distributes it appropriately, setting one napkin by his elbow and another where Erik will sit.

Erik seems content to work in silence. Charles lets him, torn between asking Erik how things went this afternoon and keeping quiet. He doesn't want to disturb the bit of peace Erik's found tonight, but he also knows Erik hates it when Charles stews in uncertainty or edits himself because he's afraid of what Erik will do if Charles says or does something wrong. He has to admit, over the past year Erik's never once snapped at him or given him cause to regret asking. And, Charles knows, he _should_ ask.

_How_ , he winces as he falls reflexively back on his telepathy. It's too late to stop now; he's got Erik's attention, those sharp grey eyes fixed on him, although Erik's still soft and receptive. _How did the case go today?_

Erik frowns, though Charles can tell it's just him in thought, not anger or upset. "It went well," Erik says. "It's coming together nicely." He pauses, mulling over his next words. "Moira's set to give an interview tomorrow," he adds, after a few seconds. "Partly about the case specifically, but I gather there's going to be a broader focus to the piece, too, about mutants and the justice system."

His words come out fairly even, and even his thoughts are fairly subdued, which comes as a surprise to Charles. He wonders how long of a talk Erik and Moira must have had about it this afternoon; maybe Erik got the fight out of his system, then, though he wouldn't count on it. "You're not ... mad about that?" Charles says carefully. "About them using someone baseline to discuss it?"

Erik shrugs. "I'm not pleased about it, no," he admits, "but Moira offered me the opportunity to do it first, and better her than me. Obviously I'd rather have more mutant representation about our own issues, but I still trust Moira more than anybody else who could do it." Even after so many years with the force, Erik hasn't totally defeated his uncertainty around authority, and it still comes to play with Moira's higher-ups. On the same level as Erik, there's always Logan, but ... he's _Logan_. Not exactly someone you want going on camera.

The rice cooker dings as it goes off, and Erik turns to take care of it, still tossing the vegetables together in the pan behind his back. He places the bowl of rice on the breakfast bar in front of Charles, along with two plates, and Charles concentrates on serving them both as Erik takes the stir-fry off the heat and mixes in some chopped herbs and a last drizzle of soy sauce. 

Charles sips at his wine as Erik comes around to sit next to him, digging his warm hand into Charles's shoulder for just a moment before he sits.

"What did you get up to today?" Erik asks. He drifts the metal serving spoon and pan over to Charles can help himself.

Charles hears honest curiosity, but also hears a flicker of the bone-deep worry that Charles leaving work early by himself could portend other things. Change. "I had coffee with Scott and Jean," he says. "They were both impressed when I told them I was going to drag you out to see the holiday displays."

"Nice of them," Erik says sarcastically. He begins to eat, quick, efficient bites.

"I'm sorry I had to leave today," Charles confesses. He might as well get that over with too. This is the first time he's stuck to the letter of his consultancy agreement and gotten out of wrapping up a case. "It's just..." He laughs. "After Maddy Lockwood, I thought nothing could faze me, you know?" He hates how he sounds; even when a case upsets Erik, like Evelyn Russo's so clearly has, he doesn't have the option of stepping away and giving the work to someone else. "But... I don't know."

"Don't worry, Charles." Erik's stopped eating and has turned to regard him with his usual quiet seriousness. "You've only been doing this for a year; it takes a lot longer than that to build up..." He snorts. "A tolerance, I suppose. And these cases are always harder."

Charles sneaks a hand over to Erik, hesitantly curling it around Erik's wrist. Erik and comfort never quite fit in the same room together when Erik's defenses are up, as they are now. It's easier when Erik's off his guard – usually, mostly asleep – or too tired to protest. Along with the touch, Charles sends a flicker of warmth and pride and resolution.

"Finish eating," Erik says, a bit gruffly, but he doesn't shake Charles's touch away, and Charles can feel the sliver of pleased affection that he's letting out. 

Charles lets go of him and turns his attention back to his plate. The food is delicious, but he's mostly concerned with finishing it quickly, eager to seek out more of the hot body-hunger that keeps flickering oh-so-briefly through Erik's mind.

Erik whisks the plate away almost as soon as Charles has taken the last bite, setting it in the sink with the rest of the dishes. "Give them time to soak," Erik says, filling the sink up with soapy water, as if he needs to give Charles an excuse for not washing them all and taking care of them immediately.

Charles's skin is already prickling with excitement, goosebumps all over, as he stands up from the stool. He can feel the heat rising in his face already, just from anticipation, before they've even touched. When he reaches Erik, he hooks his arms around his waist, pressing up close all along his body. He rests his forehead in the center of Erik's chest, against the soft, worn fabric of his hoodie, and breathes in Erik's scent.

"Take me to bed?" Charles says. After all these months, he has to trust that the plaintive hitch in his voice is sexy, not pathetic. Not weak, not anything Erik would ever use against him.

Erik buries his hands in Charles's hair, not pulling but clutching firmly, and uses his grip to tilt his head, so they're looking at each other face to face. "I'd like you to fuck me tonight," Erik says softly. "What do you think?"

"I think you almost gave me a heart attack," Charles gasps. He leans up to kiss Erik, hard, smiling the way he knows Erik likes when Erik opens up for him. Unlike nearly every kiss they've shared this week, this is fierce and dirty, Erik's tongue stroking alongside Charles's, drawing back only to bite at Charles's lips and chin. Erik starts to shepherd him back out of the kitchen, directing him with that big, strong body of his and glancing, firm touches against Charles's shoulders and sides.

Then Erik turns them so he's got Charles up against the wall, hitched up on his toes. His hands have made their way back to Charles's hair again, clutching the thick, soft strands like Erik's drowning. Charles purrs, loving the pressure, the desperation with which Erik holds on to him this way. Even better, he can get his own hands around Erik's hips and pull him so their legs are interlocked, so Erik's cock is hard up against Charles's stomach and he can rub himself idly along Erik's thigh.

And just as good, even better, are the molten thoughts spilling out of Erik and into Charles, a whirl of images and sensations like quicksilver. How good Charles always feels, how responsive, a selfish thrill that Erik's the only person who gets to see him like this. When Charles pulls him even closer, his hands slipping under Erik's jeans, Erik hisses, a low, pleased noise. _Want you to fuck me_ , Erik thinks hazily at him as Charles toys with the powerful, sleek muscle right at the top curve of Erik's ass. _Tell me you want that, Charles. Please._

_Yes_ , Charles sends back, just as fervently. They don't often do it this way, but when they have... Charles trembles in Erik's arms. _You'll feel so good around me, darling... I can't wait, need you._

He'd be ashamed of the neediness he can't disguise if it weren't for the need Erik can't hide from him, so great it rises up like a wave and blocks everything out and inundates him. He registers their movement only as an inarticulate tangle of limbs stumbling for the bedroom, as Erik stripping his sweater and shirts off and his power yanking at any metal on them – the zip of his hoodie, their jeans. Charles kicks his shoes off as best he can because he can't bend down to untie them, not with Erik crushing him against his chest and _lifting_ him into another kiss, bare skin against bare skin this time, and Charles refuses to break contact, not until he has to.

It's Erik who has to push him away in the end, with a softer kiss in apology, before he turns to the bed, pulling the comforter and topsheet off to the floor. When Charles manages to look beyond Erik's body, he notices the neat pile on the nightstand – lube, a box of condoms, a bath towel. Erik picks up the latter now, spreading it across the mattress; it'll save them a change of sheets tonight and a wet spot, yet more laundry. Thinking ahead, Charles realizes, Erik has been _planning_ this...

Sudden image in his head: Erik, home from work, changing out of his clothes, pausing in his underwear to eye the bed, fondle himself thinking of Charles – and then stopping, tucking his half-hard cock into his jeans, knowing it will be sweeter to wait until Charles is back here with him.

"God," Charles breathes. Erik half-turns toward him, faintly questioning, and Charles practically throws himself at Erik, tumbling them both over onto the bed. They roll a few times, a playful wrestle for dominance, ending with Erik on his back and Charles on top of him. He takes hold of Erik's wrists, both of them this time, a strange mirror of the gesture at the table. His fingers don't quite complete the circle around Erik's bones, and he can feel acutely all the strength Erik is holding back as he lets Charles pin his arms up above his head. 

He kisses Erik again, pushing all his complicated storm of emotion into it, until Erik is shaking under him, the same way Charles is shaking. 

"I can't wait to be inside you," Charles says, trailing a line of kisses from Erik's mouth to his ear. He takes Erik's earlobe into his mouth, teasing it between his teeth.

"Get to it, then," Erik says breathlessly, arching up beneath him.

For answer, Charles leans up and over Erik to grab the lube. It gives Erik the chance to clutch at Charles's sides and lean up to nip and play with his nipples, rocking eagerly against him. Charles nearly drops the bottle, curling around the slick sharpness of Erik's mouth and teeth as Erik works him, mouth on one nipple while fingers toy with the other. _Erik_ , Charles thinks at him, unable to filter out his desperation, _please, it's too good._

Pliantly enough, Erik collapses back into the sheets. He shifts his legs apart, purposefully rocking hips so his cock rubs up against Charles's ass. _My turn tonight_ , Charles tells him wickedly as he knees backward, matching a slow smile to the thought. It gets a tug on his hair and a fond _monster_ from Erik before Erik lets him go and Charles can situate himself between those long, powerful thighs. _Gonna suck you while I get you ready for me_ , he tells Erik, just a twist of imperiousness to the words. It gets him _oh, by all means_ in Erik's indulgently teasing tone, and whine of protest when Charles responds with _if you're going to be like that..._

Of course he gives in. There's no way he can't, not with Erik's mind singing out his need and definitely not with his gorgeous cock so thick and hard, already slick at the tip. Charles hastily lubes up his fingers and settles himself, taking Erik's cockhead into his mouth as he begins to trail wet fingers down Erik's crease.

"Fuck, Charles," Erik grates out, his head falling back into his pillows. "God, your mouth..."

Charles hums and lets Erik see the depth of his smugness. It's a rush, always, having Erik like this, all that power and control shivering to bits as Charles sucks and licks him – almost as good as how much he loves the taste and feel of Erik in his mouth, the pictures he gets of himself when Erik can finally get his eyes open to look down the long, quivering length of his body and see Charles nestled between his legs.

Erik groans when Charles gives him the first finger, automatically surging up away from the penetration, pushing himself deeper into Charles's mouth; it's only the sheer amount of practice Charles's had taking him in that keeps him from choking. As it is, he encourages it, moaning around the slick hot flesh in his mouth.

Erik's impatient like this, when he's on the bottom, so Charles doesn't hesitate in adding another finger before the point where he'd be ready for it himself. Erik thrives on that stretch, that push; he doesn't like the tease that Charles revels in so much of the time. Charles curls his fingers inside him, seeking out his prostate. Erik spasms around him as the red-tinted cloud of his lust sparks bright for a moment. 

Charles draws off Erik's cock, licking up and down the length as he continues to stretch Erik open. His own cock is hanging heavy and erect between his legs; he has to resist the urge to let himself lie on his belly, because he suspects he'd come the second he allows himself to rub against the sheets.

"Do it, Charles," Erik says, yanking on Charles's hair, hard enough to drag him away from where he's been concentrating on the head of Erik's cock, tonguing his slit where the fluid's welled up. He drags Charles in for a kiss, sloppy and wet and biting, before pushing him away again. Charles pulls his fingers out and kneels up to allow Erik to roll over onto his stomach.

He runs his clean hand up and down Erik's back, feeling the muscles flex and tremble beneath him like a horse that's just finished a race. He reaches to the nightstand again to grab a condom. They rarely use them, mostly keeping them around for the special occasions when the toys come into play, but not only. When Charles is getting fucked, he gets off on that part, too, the mess and filth of Erik's come dripping wet out of his used hole; Erik doesn't find the aftermath so much of a turn-on. And, too, sometimes Charles is grateful for a little bit of lessened sensitivity – there's something about fucking Erik that makes him shoot off embarrassingly fast. The first time they tried it, he'd barely gotten inside him before coming.

At least he's refined some of his control enough to do to himself what he's done for Erik sometimes: use his abilities to back himself off, take the edge of the urgent need to come. It's what he does now, and it's enough for him to slide the condom on and slick it up without going off like a damn rocket. Still, he doesn't go slow as he stretches Erik one last time because he's _so fucking tight_ , clenching and hot around the three fingers Charles manages to get in him.

"Ready, darling?" he asks, and he gets a growl in response, Erik dropping his head between hunched shoulders and arching his back. He's entirely too beautiful to look at, with the long, slick expanse of his spine and how his broad shoulders run down into his waist and the two symmetrical dimples just above his ass. Charles kisses those, unable to do anything else, tonguing up the bit of sweat collected in them while Erik moans and curses, his mental voice richly flavored with desperation.

He can't wait anymore. Charles positions himself, slick cock painting even more lube around Erik's hole. Erik growls and Charles pushes in, slowly, a frantic _no, no, Erik, don't, go slow_ when Erik tenses to shove himself back. Erik's so tight despite the stretching and all the lube Charles has got in him, and while Erik is more than willing to forge through the pain, to take it to show Charles he doesn't have to be worried, Charles can't bear the thought of hurting Erik, even in – especially in – a time and place like this. _Please let me do this, darling_ , he sends, along with a mock-teasing _don't make me hold you down_. That gets a shiver and a headrush of lust from Erik, and _oh_ , Erik thinking about Charles holding him down with his abilities, using Erik however he likes...

"Erik," Charles gasps. He pushes in that last bit, the last few inches an easy slide until his hips are snugged up tight to Erik's ass. Erik clenches around him, moaning thickly in the back of his throat, his mind a tumult of how much he needs this, how much he loves Charles, not just for this but for everything, how he's needed to feel Charles's naked body against his own for so long now.

He reaches around and gets his hand back on Erik's cock – Erik always softens a little when Charles first enters, but it doesn't take much, just a few slick strokes and he's completely stiff again in Charles's hand.

"All right," Charles says, "all right, you can move now – "

Erik doesn't even let him finish before he's pressing back hard against Charles's cock, and then forward into Charles's fist, rough and a little desperate. Charles lets him set the rhythm, following his lead, feeling a little as if he's holding on for dear life. 

The truth is – and Charles sort of hates to admit this to himself – most of the time, when they have sex, some part of Erik holds back a little. Erik's proud of his control, in every part of his life, and while Charles is skilled at making him lose that, it's still rare it overcomes Erik's priority of looking to Charles's pleasure. Maybe part of it is that bed is the only place Charles really _has_ always let Erik take care of him, from the very beginning.

But like this... Erik's not thinking about making Charles come, not thinking about stamina or technique, not doing anything but seeking out his own pleasure, working himself on Charles's cock, trusting that Charles is getting just as much out of it, that Charles will do what he needs, what they _both_ need. 

There's a constant stream of rude words pouring out of Erik's mouth, soft but fervent, occasionally with Charles's name mixed in. It's too disorganized, too filthy, to be a chant, but it isn't a song either, just breath that sometimes lets itself be words, breath that slowly breaks apart as Erik gives himself up.

He speeds up his strokes, keeping them tight and fast, the way he knows Erik likes. Erik grunts incoherently, hips flexing as he chases after more of Charles filling him up, jerking a little when the head of Charles's cock brushes across his prostate. It won't take long, not with the two of them so frantic for it after so long, and Charles forgets any finesse he might have had, or any idea of letting this drag out, twines himself up in Erik's pleasure, and lets Erik pull him over.

Erik cries out, a single, emphatic _fuck, Charles, so –_ and tightens viciously around him as he comes, cock jerking and striping Charles's hand and the towel with white streaks. Charles moans, feeling Erik's come slick between his fingers, and the ringing aftershocks of Erik's orgasm sets off his own. He hits his climax sudden, hard, the pleasure sweeping him up so his mind almost goes blank, and he can't think beyond how good this is, how good Erik is for him, his mind pouring affection into Erik's, along with gratitude and relief and everything else Charles can't tell him during the day.

All at once his muscles give out. He collapses clumsily on Erik's back, saving him from taking all of Charles's weight by getting his hands underneath himself. As it is, they both sink down onto the mattress together, Charles pulling out slowly to roll over onto his back so Erik can roll out of the wet spot. Erik comes with him, covering Charles this time, kissing him deep and heartfelt. Charles traces a shaky hand down his side, loving the slick skin over hard muscle, cleaning up a bit of slick with his fingertips as Erik trembles.

_I wish we could just be like this all the time_ , Charles thinks lazily, letting his mind curl around Erik's, mirroring their bodies. _I love you so much, god, Erik, it's always so good, how is it always so good..._

Charles babbles in bed. Things he wouldn't say any other place, any other time, they come spilling out of his mouth or his mind to Erik, filthy, sweet, ridiculous things. Things he didn't even know he was thinking, most of the time – things that don't even make _sense_ , out of this context, when he thinks back on them later, but always feel so right in the moment.

He can feel the curve of Erik's smile against his cheek. "Let me take care of this, baby," Erik whispers, reaching between them to remove the condom, fingers stroking more than strictly necessary against Charles's sensitive cock. He rises up from the bed, then, tying the condom and throwing it into the trashbin, tugging the towel off the bed and throwing it into the hamper. Charles watches him with eager eyes; he never gets tired of watching the movement of Erik's naked body, like an animate Greek statue and an anatomy lesson all in one.

The sweat's cooling rapidly on his body, without Erik's skin against his, and Charles shivers, alone on the bed. "Come back here," he says sternly, holding his hand out in command. It gains him a raised eyebrow and a smirk from Erik, but Erik comes, anyway, picking up the comforter from the floor to cover them as he wraps his body tight around Charles's.

Erik's mind is open, loose, soft in a way it never is as he radiates his affection out toward Charles. It's such a marked contrast to the tension and frustration that's been such a part of him lately. Charles doesn't fool himself that he's fucked that out of Erik for good, but even a temporary reprieve is something marvelous.

"Are you sure we have to go out tomorrow?" Erik asks, lazily nuzzling at the join of Charles's neck and shoulder. "We could stay here, have breakfast in bed..." That suggestion comes with an image of Erik feeding Charles a strawberry, Charles's mouth stained even redder with the juice. In turn that image dissolves into other activities, none of which involve them leaving the apartment.

"Just one day," Charles says, giving Erik his most pleading look. "And you _did_ promise..."

Erik sighs, but it sounds more aggravated than he actually is. He returns to petting Charles, long, slow touches that read like he's touching Charles out of contentment, just for the pleasure of stroking and remembering precisely how Charles feels when he's pliant and happy. They kiss slowly, more nudges of mouth against mouth and warm breath than anything purposeful, and Erik's happiness wraps around Charles, blanketing him the same way his body does. Charles is surrounded with it, with warmth and care, and he has to reflect some of that back at Erik, showing him some bit of how much Charles loves him, how there's no other place he can imagine being.

* * *

The next morning dawns clear and brisk, although wrapped up under blankets and a still-drowsing Erik as he is, Charles's impression of what it's like outside comes from a few minds remarking to themselves about the shift in the weather, the need for more layers or a better coat. Charles snuggles into the hot comfort of Erik's body, soaking up a few more minutes of quiet as Erik works through the last of his dream.

Erik hadn't had any nightmares last night that Charles can tell. He never interferes in Erik's dreams unless Erik asks, and those occasions are rare enough. It's not that Erik distrusts Charles's ability – he's asked for Charles to keep him from dreaming some nights, when he can't lose sleep to his old fears – but that he feels they keep the fire of his anger burning. Part of him believes he deserves them, for failing his mother. Charles wishes he could convince Erik otherwise, that remembering his mother only with love and not with blood and pain would honor her memory just as much, but that's probably sunk too deeply in Erik to ever change.

Slowly, Erik comes up from sleep. It's something Charles never tires of watching, how Erik's dream-hazy grey eyes open, the smile on his face and the soft, complete happiness when he registers Charles lying in his arms, body curving into him like iron filings to a magnet.

"Hey there," Charles murmurs. He kisses Erik, enjoying how Erik's morning stubble scratches his lips. "Did you sleep well?"

"Tolerably," Erik says. Without changing his position, he floats his watch over from the dresser so he can check the time. "You must have worn me out last night," he says with a little surprise. "I don't think I've slept that long in weeks."

"Making up for a deficit, I should think." Charles stretches, starting the slow process of disconnecting their bodies from one another. Erik makes a displeased noise as Charles tosses the blanket back, letting cold air into their pocket of bed as he gets up. Charles heads toward his drawer in the dresser, pulling out a pair of pajama pants and a long sleeved tee to cover himself up. "You can have first shower this morning," he says.

"Thank god," Erik says. Charles finishes dressing and turns to watch Erik rise out of the bed, eyes drawn immediately to the swing of his dick, and then the tight muscles of his ass as he shifts away with a yawn. "I feel like I'm gonna itch out of my skin from not cleaning up better last night."

Charles grins and heads to the kitchen to start Erik's coffee. 

It's less than an hour before they're out of the apartment. Charles feels bundled up to within an inch of his life, between his sweater, coat, scarf, hat and gloves. Erik, on the other hand, seems content to get by with just a peacoat and a very thin pair of leather gloves.

"It's freezing out," Charles says disapprovingly.

Erik makes a dismissive gesture. "I'll be fine." He pokes Charles in the chest with one of his long bony fingers, causing Charles to yelp and squirm away. "I'm surprised you could even feel that."

"I remember you saying once you wanted me like this all the time, all swaddled like an Eskimo."

He gives Erik the memory, which brings a hot flood of embarrassment and possessiveness up from Erik's core. Erik looks away, but tugs Charles close all the same, their arms tight against each other and fingers twined together. It's as close to an obvious display of affection as Erik can bring himself to come in public, which Charles understands. Truth be told, outside of his wilder moments, the moments of fantasy he indulges in, the firm, steady warmth of Erik's love is more than enough of an assertion, more profound than a kiss stolen in full view of a crowded street.

And the streets, Charles decides, certainly _are_ crowded. The tide of tourists and shoppers sweeps them up out of the subway and onto Fifth Avenue. The noise, physical and telepathic, is almost overwhelming. The shouts and ringing bells and honking horns, Charles ignores with long practice; he'd used the subway to start building up his shields, and now he turns to Erik.

_Do you mind if I use you as a focus?_ he asks. _It's something I learned from some readings Jean gave me... I can use your mind to help tune out all the white noise – cutting out the static, I suppose. It means I won't have to work so hard to maintain my shields._

It's a question he's been putting off asking, and he's not entirely sure why. Erik's been nothing but welcoming when it comes to Charles's telepathy, his only concern the fact that Charles _isn't_ concerned by what Erik sees as this terrible, irrevocable darkness in his thoughts. Slowly, Erik's starting to see otherwise, that Charles sees the darkness but sees the light too, and understands that they're inseparable. Still, this – a new development in his abilities, making it clear to Erik how much Charles relies on him... Part of Charles still flinches from the implication of weakness. Now, surrounded by thousands upon thousands of noisy, chaotic minds, he doesn't really have a choice.

_What do you need me to do?_ Erik says, frowning slightly, as in concentrating in advance.

_You don't really have to do anything_, Charles says. _Just ... be here, I guess._

_Well_ , Erik says, _I'm definitely that._ He squeezes Charles's hand.

Charles squeezes back, taking a deep breath as he prepares himself. He focuses on Erik, his unmistakable clarity and unique mind like a beacon in the storm of the crowded city, and lets himself go in a little further. It's like a blanket against the cold, or a thin curtain against the sun – everything else is still there, still accessible, but not so immediate; there's a distance that allows Charles to breathe more easily.

Erik is looking at him thoughtfully, his mouth pursed into a considering expression. "I can feel the difference like this," he says. "You're so close this way."

_And that's a good thing_ , Charles says, unable to keep it from being half a question, no matter how sure he is of the answer.

"Yeah," Erik says, smiling down at him, "that's a good thing."

Charles has to look away from Erik, clear his throat and change the subject. The shop they're passing by is a welcome new topic. He tugs on Erik's arm with some excitement. "Oh, Erik, let's stop here first. I swear, they have the best hot chocolate you've ever tasted."

He cajoles Erik into a drinking chocolate with peppers and espresso, and nearly regrets it when Erik takes his first sip and sighs thickly, a sound Charles has only heard him make in bed. With his mind bound as close to Erik as it is, he picks up some of what Erik's tasting, the smooth chocolate and the sudden burn of the peppers and cinnamon, the bitter espresso lying underneath. Of course Erik would categorize things like this, parceling the experience out into discrete pieces of data. It doesn't diminish his pleasure at all, but is so different from the way Charles would encounter it, Charles can't help but be enthralled.

As they make their escape from the crowded shop, he starts to drink his own hot chocolate, crowned with a tower of whipped cream and chocolate shavings. After his first sip, Erik thinks _you've got something..._ and, daringly for Erik, swipes an ungloved finger across Charles's upper lip. Charles smirks up at him and licks the cream off Erik's fingertip.

_Enough_ , Erik thinks, both stern and indulgent at once. _How else are you going to torture me today?_

_All the displays_ , Charles says gleefully. _And maybe the skating rink at Rockefeller Center. And you'll have to tell me what you want for Christmas. Or_ , he adds hesitantly, thinking of the menorah back home, _Hanukkah. I – I saw the menorah yesterday, when I woke up._

Erik quirks his mouth into something that's not quite a smile. He pushes a memory at Charles, rather clumsily: it's a little faded, creased like an old photograph that's been folded and unfolded too many times. A very young Erik and his mother, lighting the candles together. 

_No gifts_ , Erik says. _The menorah's on the window sill now, and you can help me with the lights tonight, all right? And I'll make us latkes for dinner. That was always the best part, anyway._

_All right_ , Charles agrees. _But you will let me get you a Christmas present, then?_

Erik snorts. _Of course. I already know you're going to drag a sad little Charlie Brown tree into my place. We might as well have presents beneath it._

They've been walking as they silently talk, making their way through the crowded sidewalks. They're still holding hands, and it gives Charles a silly odd thrill that warms him up all through his chest. 

Charles stops them in front of one store window so he can look more closely. It's bright and brash and exuberant, like Santa's workshop has exploded all over. He loves it. A rocking horse rocks back and forth, a tin soldier sitting astride it and waving a gaily-painted gun. Just beneath the horse's rockers, a red-green-white train runs around its track; instead of carrying coal, it carries presents on its never-ending loop through fluffy white cotton snow and mountains of boxes with bows. The tableau, Charles notices, has various iterations in the next three windows, including a Nutcracker Princess surrounded by (in Erik's thoughts, unnervingly dead-eyed) nutcracker attendants.

_A little tacky, don't you think?_ Erik says dryly. _A monument to consumerism and sentimentality._

_That's what makes it great_ , Charles argues. _It should be about excess, you know? If there's any time that doesn't call for restraint and tastefulness, it's Christmas. It's supposed to be ridiculous and joyful and over-the-top._ He can't help contrasting with the annual Christmas parties at the mansion: all white crystal and perfect silver snowflakes and perhaps a few very carefully distributed strands of garland, crowds of people sipping champagne and murmuring quietly and nobody particularly liking each other. Charles always had a brief turn of being shown off like a prize specimen, but once he was released he'd go and hide in his room with his books, read about families and parties and magic.

He should, of course, have long accepted that _The Polar Express_ wasn't the most reliable foundation on which to build his picture of how things should be, nor were the rest of his holiday books for that matter. Regardless, memories of escaping into those books, conjuring up holly and ivy and talking animals, have clung to him. Now he shares some of those memories with Erik, of tucking himself up in bed surrounded by flannel pajamas and his comforter, picking at a little plate of desserts absently while he read.

Erik's perpetual anger spikes, but only for a moment. Instead of saying anything he knows will get Charles's back up, he says _So long as you don't expect me to wear a Santa hat._

Charles snorts. "You would be the most terrifying Santa ever."

Well," Erik says idly as he gets a hand around Charles's hip and tugs him close, "you're welcome to sit on my lap whenever you want."

"And you call _me_ a monster?" Charles laughs. "That was horrible. See if Santa brings you anything nice this year. A lump of coal might be too good for you."

"I've already got what I want," Erik says, and he says it seriously enough that Charles can't call him on the corniness of that line – and Charles doesn't even really think about it, because he feels the same way.

"Still," he turns them away from the display and directs them toward Rockefeller Center, "you have to tell me at least _one_ thing you want. One thing that isn't," he adds quickly, "me, sex, or something like new socks or a tie."

"What's wrong with new socks?" Erik says, though when Charles shoots him a faux glare, he gives in. "You'll have to give me time to think of something, though."

Charles has to allow the fairness of that. He's excited, though, about the prospect. This year will be the first in a long time where he has people to shop for, and while he obviously didn't forget how much he enjoys it, he's managed to avoid thinking about it directly. He has a list half-sketched out in his mind already – something practical for Scott, obviously, maybe a new laptop bag that isn't falling apart; something beautiful for Jean, a piece of jewelry or a music box, something fine and precious. Even the others at the station, where he's leaning toward simple things: flowers, chocolates, a box of cigars for Logan.

The crush of people, already tight, increases by that much more as they get closer. Charles can sense the faint strain of bitchiness starting to creep up in Erik, though he's still working at not letting Charles see it. Charles has no problem ignoring it entirely, especially when they finally make it to the giant spruce dominating the plaza at Rockefeller Center.

_Look at that_ , he says, gesturing to the tree with his free hand. _Isn't that gorgeous?_

_It's ... certainly a big tree_ , Erik responds. He says this despite the fact that he's feeling out the metal decorations in the tree, hundreds of little aluminum ornaments that glitter like stars.

Charles elbows him in the ribs, which only gets him a faux innocent expression in response, and Erik grabbing both of his arms to hold him still and prevent further attacks. The hold transforms into something a little closer to a hug, with Charles's head tucked up under Erik's chin, Erik's grip loosening to slide around his back, keeping Charles's arms pinned to his sides. "You have no magic in your soul," Charles tells him. "You're cuddly as a cactus and charming as an eel."

Erik breathes out a soft laugh. "So I'm The Grinch, now?" he mumbles into Charles's hair, nosing at it. "Are you sure you should be insulting me? I know Christmas isn't my holiday, but I remember there being something about bad boys getting coal in their stockings, instead of presents."

"I'm a very good boy," Charles says seriously. When Erik laughs again, he says, "What? I am!"

"For a given value of 'good,'" Erik agrees. He rocks back and forth a little, tugging Charles along with him. "So, Spirit of Christmas Present, what are we doing next?"

"Well," Charles thinks for a second, gauging Erik's mood and what might alleviate it. "I thought we could get something to eat and sit and be obnoxiously mushy while holding hands."

"Everything but the obnoxiously mushy sounds good." Erik does suffer himself to be led to a restaurant that, while crowded, isn't deafening or packed wall-to-wall, with – telepathy is very useful for finding these things out – an empty table in the back just right for a misanthrope and his boyfriend. As they walk to the back together, Charles can't help but think of the first time they'd gone out to eat as a couple and not as work partners, the giddy, dangerous excitement of holding Erik's hand. That Erik knows the fear that had propelled Charles to make that leap – to want their relationship to be something other people saw, just after thinking it wouldn't exist anymore – means so much to Charles he never fails to be stunned when he thinks of it.

It's like learning it all over again, that he loves Erik, the knowledge just as – not devastating, but total, consuming all of him. It has him quiet as the hostess seats them and gives them their menus, only running anxious, disbelieving mental fingers over Erik's mind before he realizes what he's doing and stops himself.

"What is it?" Erik murmurs, not looking up from his menu.

"Nothing," Charles says. "You know, if you get the reuben, you're going to smell like sauerkraut all day."

"Maybe I like the smell of sauerkraut," Erik says stubbornly, but when the waiter comes around he orders a steak salad instead, along with a beer. Charles has to settle for a Coke to go with his pasta.

When the waiter's gone again, Charles takes a deep breath and scoots his chair a little closer to Erik's, hooking his foot around Erik's ankle. "There is something I kind of wanted to talk to you about," Charles says. He can hear the unusual shakiness in his voice, and he hates himself for it a little bit, but he closes his eyes and lets himself use Erik's presence as a comfort to calm his suddenly edgy nerves.

Erik, of course, doesn't miss the shift in Charles's mood. His thoughts press out towards Charles's in an unsteady probe – _what is it, what's wrong_ – although all he says aloud is, "Charles?" in a calm voice.

Charles opens his eyes again. "I got a notice from my landlord," he starts. "I mean, I've been thinking about it for a while, but not in an immediate way, I guess, but this makes it immediate. And, I mean, it's not like I'm there that often, so it's kind of a waste of money, don't you think? And your place is closer to things, and you have a dishwasher and washing machine and all that, and I just... I've gotten used to it. It just makes sense, I guess. Right?"

He stops talking, aware that he's been babbling, and licks his lips. Erik is staring at him, eyes wide and mouth hanging open just a bit.

"Charles," Erik says slowly, "are you suggesting we move in together?"

"Only if I can chip in for rent and utilities," Charles says. "But... I... yes. Yes, if you want to. And obviously I'm not expecting an answer right away, I know – I know you'll want to think about it. There'll be some pros and cons to work through, I'm sure..."

He trails off just before diving into his list of reasons why they'd have to negotiate a few things, how Charles living with Erik will be different than their current arrangement. The words he'd rehearsed fade away, reduced to nothing by the way Erik's looking at him, soft and disbelieving, almost vulnerable. Erik's mind is a litany of _didn't want to push, didn't want to hope, does he know I've been thinking about this, god, does he really want this?_ and it drowns out all of Charles's qualifications and objections.

"I'd like that, Erik," Charles says softly. He gives Erik the best smile he can offer under these circumstances, one that's maybe too hopeful, too vulnerable.

"I'd love that," Erik says, just as soft but no less emphatic. He twines their fingers together under the table, squeezing tightly. His mind is twined together with Charles's, warm and steady as a fire on a cold day, something for Charles to bask in, even if he knows he could get burned. He can't see any question in Erik's head, all his doubts locked away the way they are once Erik's decided on a course of action.

Charles wonders if he's worked through his doubts about Charles moving in already, if that's the reason why there's no hesitation in him now. All he sees is Erik's happiness, the fierce, bone-deep happiness that is the only way Erik knows how to experience that emotion, and a few hazy plans about dinner tonight to celebrate and after –

_Keep thinking like that and I won't be held responsible for what I do to you_ , Charles sends.

_That's not actually a threat_ , Erik points out, but he just holds onto Charles's hand even tighter, only letting go when the food finally arrives at the table. Even then, he seems reluctant.

The hum of Erik's satisfaction is so steady and bright that it's all Charles can focus on, as they eat and even afterwards, as they make their way back into the crowds on the streets. Erik can't stop touching him – not sexual touches, or even necessarily romantic ones, but there's never a moment as they walk when Erik's hand isn't on Charles somewhere. Charles's stomach hurts a little, the combination of pleasure and hope and fear all rolled together into a tight ball. He can't concentrate on anything, though he drags Erik along to a few more displays before he admits it to himself. 

"All right," he says finally. "We can go home now."

Erik makes a pained face, and says, forcing the words out, "Are you sure? We can do more. It's your day." He looks like he's just swallowed ill-tasting cold medicine, and Charles can't help but laugh at him.

"It's okay," Charles assures him. "It's just time for phase two of my holiday plans to begin.”

"And phase two would be...?"

"Christmas specials." Charles smiles at him. "We need to stop by my apartment to pick them up. I have a box of VHS tapes in the closet."

"Ancient tapes of _Frosty the Snowman_? Are you sure you don't want to go ice-skating?" Erik grimaces. The teasing fades when Charles sends him an obnoxiously picture-postcard image of the two of them on Erik's couch, tucked together under a fleece blanket, drinking wine and paying more attention to each other than the grainy old cartoons flickering on the screen.

"And you promised me latkes," Charles reminds him. He tugs Erik toward the subway. "Is there anything we need to get for them?"

"Besides a ton of potatoes and oil? Nothing I can think of, unless we need more sour cream or applesauce." Erik's thoughts go soft with nostalgia as he speaks, remembering piles of potatoes and his mother's instructions on how to grate them, the hot smell of oil and salt and the sound of each pancake falling into the oil with a sizzle and pop.

On the way home, Charles talks Erik into an overpriced, and appropriately sad-looking, Christmas tree that's been forgotten in the corner of a local school's Christmas-tree fundraiser. Along with it comes a tiny stand, a few tiny ornaments (Erik thinks the tree barely has enough strength to support itself, let alone a bit of tinsel and some plastic balls), and something Charles's mother had called a tree skirt, to keep the thing from shedding all over the place. The surface of Erik's thoughts are, of course, all grumbles and spines, sharp as the needles on the tree he's carrying while Charles carries the videotapes and the rest of the bags. Underneath, though, he's warm and happy, still basking in their conversation from earlier, his thoughts running ahead to tonight, to old traditions and maybe new ones.

When they reach the apartment again, Charles busies himself with finding the perfect place for the tree, rearranging the ornaments on it a few times until he determines it meets his standards. By the time he's finished, Erik's waiting in front of the TV, next to the bag of videos. Charles settles himself on the couch, picking up one of the steaming mugs Erik's set on the coffee table – coffee, judiciously spiked; Charles assumes, naturally, that the one with the whipped cream is for him – and pulls the afghan off the back of the couch into his lap.

"A Muppet Christmas Carol first," he orders, answering Erik's questioning gaze.

"I don't think I've actually used the VCR part of this thing in years," Erik says as he sets it up. Charles scoots a little to make room for him to sit down, only to invade his space again as soon as Erik's settled in.

The videos had been some of the first things he'd bought after he'd dropped out of school and moved back to New York. There had been a whole set of them, a steal at Goodwill in the off-season, and he'd watched them over and over that first year, on his tiny TV that only worked half the time, less because he loved them so much than because they were there.

He starts out mostly upright as they watch, but he finds himself snuggling further and further into Erik's lap as the movie goes on. He gives in entirely when Erik gets up to change the tape out to Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer; as soon as he's back to the couch, Charles lies down, resting his head on Erik's warm thigh, sighing as Erik runs his hand through his hair.

"You know, this movie actually could be read as an interesting allegory for the mutant experience," Charles muses, ignoring Erik's vague disdainful thoughts on claymation. "Maybe when I go back to school, I'll write a paper on it."

Erik's fingers pause for a moment in their scritches against Charles's scalp.

"What?" Charles twists around to look at him. He'd backed away from Erik's mind once they were out of the ruckus of midtown; now he doesn't entirely know if he wants to have that closeness again or not. "Erik?"

"You haven't talked about going back to school for a while," Erik says after a heartbeat. He continues to pet Charles, fingers moving slowly and deliberately.

Charles can read some of the text underneath Erik's words: Erik's vaguely hoped that Charles wasn't serious, that they could continue to work together; he wonders if this is a sign that Charles is looking to the next stage in his life, a stage where Erik's role takes on a terrifying amorphousness. In anyone else, Charles would call it _clingy_. As it is, he's both warmed and irritated by it.

"I can't keep doing consultancy work forever," Charles says into the silence created by Erik hitting the pause button. "I don't know if it's against the rules to tell you how much I make, but it isn't much. And I feel... I don't have the ability to just keep forging through all the terrible things like you do, Erik. I _can_ , but I – " he pauses in frustration, sparing a thought to send Erik a wave of thanks for the _You're not weak, you're one of the strongest people I know_ that Erik's practically shouting at him. At last he finds something that might be the right words, only it's not words, it's Charles's own hopes and dreams and knowledge of his own limits: _I could do it, but I wouldn't be happy. If I can take over my father's company, I can help in another way, I can help rectify so many of the wrongs done against mutants. But to do that I have to go to school._

"And," he pulls himself up; it's a lot easier to have this conversation looking Erik in the eye, "it's not like... it's not like I just want to run off to the next new thing," he admits. "I love working with you. I _hate_ the thought of giving that up. But I won't ever give _you_ up, Erik. Not," he swallows, pushing back the fear that this could happen one day, for real, "unless you want me to."

"That's never going to happen," Erik says, voice just this side of dismissive. He leans forward, pressing a soft kiss to Charles's mouth, then begins to extract himself from their tangled limbs and blanket. "I'm going to start on the latkes now, I think."

Charles watches Erik's back as he heads to the kitchen, feeling a vague sense of frustration welling up inside him. "Erik," he calls, a little more loudly than might be necessary. "You know – I'm not any less committed to this than you are."

"I know that," Erik responds, but he's still not looking at Charles as he clatters around the kitchen, getting out the bowls and utensils and food processor. 

Charles frowns and rises off the couch to follow Erik into the kitchen. He settles himself on the counter, where Erik can't avoid going past him and paying attention. He kicks his heels back against the cabinet as he considers what to say.

The food processor whirs loudly as Erik begins to feed it chunks of potato, letting the disk grate them into fine shreds. It's too loud to talk over, but they don't need to speak. Charles thinks, _Do you not trust me_?

_What?_ Erik gives him a shocked look. _Of course I trust you._

_Then what is it?_ Charles folds his arms over his chest.

Erik sighs; behind him, he begins sharpening a chef's knife. _I believe you. But just because you feel something now doesn't mean you're going to feel that way forever._

Charles narrows his eyes. _I love you. That's not going to change._

The food processor comes to a stop, leaving a heavy silence in its wake. Erik dumps the pile of potatoes into their biggest bowl. "Even if that doesn't change," Erik says, "other things will."

The _if_ hits him hard. He straightens, swallowing hard around the knot of fear that's tied itself in his throat. He doesn't want to ask any more questions, he wants to forget – make Erik forget, make himself forget – a conversation that's swerved sideways and gone off a cliff.

"What," he makes himself say, "what will change?"

Erik shrugs. He's uncomfortable, as uncomfortable as Charles is, but where Charles deals with discomfort by escaping or putting up impenetrable walls of attitude, Erik becomes frustrated. And a frustrated Erik quickly becomes angry. The knife begins to cut the onion viciously, dicing it into tiny bits. Charles can hear the agitated rattle of silverware, for a moment only before Erik remembers his control and stops.

"You'll be with other people your age," Erik says at last. "It's not a matter of you having friends I don't approve of," although it's partly that, partly Erik being jealous of the time Charles spends with Jean and Scott, "it's a matter of you moving past me. Discovering bigger things, better things." _He'll have the world_ , Erik's thinking. _And once he has that, he might love me, but he won't need me anymore. And then he'll be gone, and I won't have him anymore._

"Is that really what you think?" Charles asks. His voice is working, though he doesn't understand how, coming from a place outside his control. "You think I'd just... I'd just _leave_ you? That I'd – I'd just want to be good friends after all? That you'd just be someone I'd be _fond_ of?"

"I don't _know_ what I think, Charles!" Erik says. His voice is raised, not quite a yell but not far off. Charles finds himself automatically sending out a message to neighbors on either side, telling them to ignore and forget the noise. "You're twenty years old. Do you really think that you're never going to want something more?"

Charles bites down on his lip, so viciously it hurts. "If you feel that way," he says, concentrating on getting the words out without shaking, "why would you even to be with me at all?"

Erik snorts. "I'd want to be with you even if I knew you were leaving tomorrow." _I'd take whatever scraps you chose to throw me, you idiot_. Erik rubs the heel of his hand over his eyes and then looks at Charles, full on. "Look, I didn't mean to – can we just go back in time, five minutes or so? Go back and finish your show, and I'll fry us up dinner, and we'll just go on, okay?"

Charles's throat feels tight and painful. "Erik," he starts to say helplessly, but he's cut off by the ring of his phone, still sitting on the opposite counter where he left it when they got home.

Erik picks it up, looking at the caller ID. "It's Jean," he says, voice dull. "You'll probably want to take it." He tosses the phone across to Charles, then turns around and leaves the room.

"No, I don't want to." He swipes a finger across the screen to reject the call and sends Jean a flicker of apology, carefully keeping back the reason he isn't answering – although, really, she probably knows, between how well she knows him and the fact he's not entirely in control of the nuances of his abilities. Deal with that later, he decides; for now, he chases Erik down the short hallway and into the bedroom.

"What the fuck was that?" he demands. Fear is, _finally_ , giving way to anger. "Were you – were you trying to set me up? Was that a fucking _test_?"

"No," Erik says stubbornly. "That was me telling you I don't want to have this conversation."

Charles struggles for calm, and for the knowledge that this is part of Erik that can't be easily rooted out. He's used to having the people and things he loves taken from him, not because it happens often but the two times it has, it's nearly destroyed him. His mother, of course, and less obviously, Shaw; Charles thinks Shaw's betrayal of him, his lies, have cut Erik nearly as deeply as the loss of the mother he'd adored. Either way, he tries to tell himself, this is how Erik copes with loss or the potential of it, alternately holding on tight like a lion with its prey, or pushing it away to minimize the pain.

That doesn't mean he can turn a blind eye to it, not when he's the one being clawed.

"We're having this conversation," Charles tells him. He draws himself up, fixing Erik's gaze with his. He can't flinch, not now. "And it isn't about you thinking I'm going to just... just _leave_ once a new shiny thing comes along." It's partly that, but really, it's just a symptom. "Do you realize what it was like for me, to hear that you don't trust me to know my own mind? You're still treating me like a stupid kid, Erik! You'd rather think that I'd be perfectly happy leaving you than think I really have found the one person who understands me, the one person," he drags in a breath because he's going to start crying and he is _not going to fucking cry_ , "who ever bothered to look and see me?"

"Just because the rest of the world has been too stupid to appreciate you doesn't mean that's going to be true forever," Erik says. "I'm just trying to be realistic." He takes a step forward, closing the distance between them and trying to pull Charles into his arms; Charles shoves awkwardly at his chest. 

"No, don't!" 

Erik backs away, sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands spread wide across his thighs. "I don't think you'd be happy leaving me," he says carefully. "I don't even – maybe it will never happen. I'm saying I don't know what's going to happen, Charles. Are you so sure of the future? Do you think I don't know how scared you are? Even this afternoon, at the restaurant, you were freaking out, you could barely get the words out to ask me – "

"That's a completely different thing," Charles cries out, but Erik talks over him.

"I love you, I don't want anything else but you, but we both know you want other things. Whether it's school, or your stupid fucking friends – "

"Oh my _god_ ," Charles says, and the only thing keeping him from rolling his eyes is the tears he can still feel lurking painfully and the suspicion that the movement would let them fall. "Are you really that jealous of me spending time with another human being?"

Erik glares at him, and even as his mouth says "No," Charles can hear the angry, self-loathing _yes, yes I am fucking jealous. You have everyone else and I've got –_

On any other day, in any other conversation, he'd let that pass by, but not now. He can feel every instinct in him shouting at him to run, to get out of here _now_ before either he or Erik says something they can't take back, worse, before he gives in and bows to what Erik wants.

"If you're going to dictate who I can or can't spend my time with, if you want to chain me up because you can't stand the thought of me even _being around_ other people, much less liking them, then I'm leaving," Charles says tightly. "I can't – I _can't_. I won't."

"Charles, I want – " Erik raises a hand and takes a step forward before he catches himself, but not before Charles takes a swift step back.

"What you want doesn't matter much right now," Charles says, and fuck, he _is_ crying. "I _trusted_ – " God, stupid goddamn tears, they're getting in the way of his words, his _thoughts_ , and he wants to fling himself into Erik's arms and tell him he's sorry, he's sure they can work this out eventually but let's just have a nice evening. He pushes the heel of his hand impatiently against his eyes to clear the tears from them.

"I'm leaving," Charles says, as calmly as he can. He says it because anything else would mean giving in, sacrificing everything just to appease Erik's insecurities. And giving in now means he'll keep on giving, and giving, and giving, until he's bled dry. It will be like his father and mother all over again, and anyone else Charles had tried to please and keep happy before he learned better. 

"Charles," Erik whispers. His eyes are shattered, grey, prismatic with tears of their own.

Charles shakes his head. "Don't follow me."

He backs out the door, one finger on Erik's mind to remind him to stay still, to stay back. He collects his jacket and scarf, hat and gloves, and it's only when he's on the street, curled into himself to hide from the light bit of frozen rain, that he lets go of his hold on Erik's mind and lets himself vanish.

The way home is a blur. He's made his way between these two spots so many dozen times that he can do it without even thinking about it, which is good, because that's basically what he has to do, muscle memory reminding him when to walk, when to get on the bus and get off. His mind is too filled with reliving the conversation, over and over, in blindingly clear and perfect detail, this time with scathing commentary about everything he should have done differently. 

_I should have said this. I should have done that. I should have let it go. I shouldn't have pushed. I should have known better._ Over and over and over again, a train of thought that he can't shake loose. 

With how distracted he is, it makes sense that it's not until he gets to his building and reaches into his coat pocket that he realizes he's left his keys back at Erik's. 

He can see exactly where they are, too, now that he thinks about it: on top of the VCR, next to the empty video case. Charles had thrown them into the bag with the tapes after he left the apartment earlier, and he can remember now Erik taking them out when he set up the movie for them. 

At least he wasn't stupid enough to forget his phone. Small mercies. He gets the answering machine when he calls his landlord; he leaves a message and walks around the side of the building to the fire escape to sit on the cold metal stairs and wait.

Charles hugs himself tight and leans his head against the railing. The minutes stretch out into five, ten, fifteen, before they go away altogether. Now that he's alone, he could go ahead and cry without guilt, but the tears are no longer there. He just feels ... empty. He wonders how much of that is just the physical echo of the mental space that's been taken up by having a thread of his attention on Erik's mind all these months, that's totally free and open now. 

He knows it's a stupid idea, but he ignores every intelligent part of him telling him that and reaches out for just a moment. Just for a second, he promises himself, just to check, and then he won't do it again. 

Charles reaches out, dipping lightly into Erik's mind –

– alcohol, so much alcohol – he's never seen Erik this drunk – and anger, and a bone deep misery –

– and the sudden snap of Erik's attention, of course, Erik knows him so well, a startled _Charles, is that you?_ with a thread of hope/fear/surprise behind it 

– And Charles closes the connection, suddenly and violently, coming back to himself, alone in the dark, shaking with his head between his knees.

_Mistake, mistake, mistake!_ he chastises himself. _Why the fuck did you do that, Xavier?_

He knows why. Erik doesn't believe it, can't believe it, but he's Charles's weakness, the one he won't ever be able to shake. Charles knows, even if they were to never see each other again, he'd always be inclined in Erik's direction, wanting to seek him out and always on the edge of caving to temptation.

While he tries to breathe himself through his panic attack, he keeps half an ear on his phone, half-expecting it to ring. It doesn't, Erik maybe clinging to sobriety and pride enough to resist calling to curse Charles out or beg him to come back. He thinks for a moment about calling Jean, but he likes her enough to not want her pity or her understanding. He doesn't want anything tonight except to be alone, and he doesn't even want _that_. Safe, maybe.

It's a good thing, he thinks darkly, that he hadn't jumped the gun and told the landlord he'd be moving out.

Eventually, after most of Charles's grief and anger has frozen into misery, the landlord's mind pops out of his car just around the corner. Charles sits up stiffly, wincing as his head responds with a vicious stab of pain. Telepathy headache, he thinks; he's been so drawn in on himself, making his psychic imprint as close to invisible as he can get it. He must still be tightly contained, because the landlord's eyes slide by him at first before snapping back and focusing on him, going wide with surprise.

"Damn!" he says. "You almost gave me a heart attack, kid."

"I'm sorry," Charles mumbles, striving for civility. "I just... I left my keys at my – at a friend's house, and he's not picking up his phone."

"Uh-huh." The landlord nods thoughtfully. Despite it going against his personal code, Charles sends him a suggestion to not pursue conversation, to just go upstairs and let Charles into his apartment. The landlord does this, occasionally glancing over his shoulder and blinking as if surprised to see Charles there.

He lets Charles into his apartment with an absent-minded comment about an extra fifty dollars being put on next month's rent for the after-hours call. Charles ignores it and shuts the door, locks and bolts it.

God, the place is empty. He looks around it, his threadbare little palace. It feels empty, with just his few bits of furniture, his old TV and books. His bedroom is just as empty, most of his clothes at Erik's – God, he'll have to go back and get his things, Charles thinks as he collapses numbly on his bed. Maybe Erik would want to tear the bandage off the wound himself and box up Charles's clothes and bring them over. Charles pictures, very vividly, his clothes in a pair of stuffed-full duffels, Erik handing them to him with that stony expression that says he's beyond hurt, that he's above all that, beyond the ability of anyone to wound him.

For himself, Charles thinks with a soft, bitter laugh, he's bleeding out. He kicks off his wet boots and curls around himself, clutching his pillow, and sends himself away.


	3. Chapter three

The first thing Charles is aware of when he comes back to himself is how hungry he is. That's the only thought in his head for a full second, maybe, until he opens his eyes and sits up and looks around his room, registering that he's back at his own place. Alone. Then, when he can't avoid it anymore, everything else comes rushing forward, demanding to be acknowledged.

Charles winces. At least the hunger is something he can fix. He swings his feet over the side of the bed and stands up, stretching out the slight soreness in his back from being curled up like that for – how long? There's darkness outside his windows, but that could mean anything in early December. He reaches out carefully, skimming the thoughts of the neighbors and people down the street; most people are still asleep, but there are some getting ready for church, which means Sunday morning. He was away for about twelve hours, then. It could be worse. At any rate, the journey did what he needed it to do. His headache is gone, as well.

He heads to the kitchen. There are still six frozen waffles, alone in the corner of his empty freezer, and he puts a few of them on to toast. He hugs himself while he waits for them to cook, trying to ignore the chill of the apartment. It's always been like this, he reminds himself, it only feels colder because he's gotten used to being at Erik's, where he keeps the thermostat at some ridiculously high level. Charles has more fleece blankets under the bed, and he's always liked bundling up in layers and wrapping up in quilts. He'll survive.

The waffles pop out of the toaster. Ignoring burned fingers, Charles butters them then devours them in a few messy bites, not bothering with the niceties of silverware or even a plate. He drifts out of the kitchen, intending to check his phone, but he stops by the front door instead, his attention caught by a blur of white in the corner of his eye.

It's a plain envelope, sitting on the floor, just inside the door. When he picks it up and looks inside, he sees his keys.

There's no note, no message at all. Erik must have seen them, realized that Charles had forgotten them and that he _needed_ those, pretty desperately, to get through the day. Charles wonders if slipping them under the door was the plan all along, or if maybe Erik had knocked, called out to Charles, while Charles was still far away.

His stomach clenches when he thinks of Erik standing at his door, calling – mentally, physically – and hearing no answer, hearing confirmation of all the fears he's tried to keep buried. Then he remembers how drunk Erik was last night, even with only an hour or so to get wasted and wonders, frantically, did Erik _drive_? Erik knows his tolerance, usually, and never drinks past it; they always cab it or go with a designated driver or walk if Erik's planning on getting too drunk to be safe. He doesn't do it often. But last night blew him past all his limits, when Charles had said what he'd said to him and then vanished.

_What you said was necessary, and how he handles it is his responsibility_ , he reminds himself. The words he'd said hurt to think about, and he knows they hurt Erik worse, but the pain doesn't negate the fact they needed to be said, or that Charles needs to know Erik won't try to control him. Intellectually, he knows that it's Erik's fear that lies at the root of last night's fight, not his jealousy or possessiveness – but they're symptoms of that fear, and they can still affect Charles. He imagines what he might be like, if he let Erik's fear shape him into a pliant, obedient thing, if he gave in fully to his own desire to be protected and sheltered and cared for. 

_Disaster_. Erik would obliterate him, and Charles wouldn't realized he'd stopped existing until it was too late.

They might well be through, after last night. Charles leans heavily against the wall, resting his head on the framing of the door. He could have seen Erik for the last time standing there, shattered and betrayed, in his bedroom. Charles tries to reconcile himself to that fact, turning the shape of it around as if trying to fit it into the hole that's opened up in his reality.

They might well be through, but the least he can do is make sure Erik is okay.

Before his courage fails him completely, he fumbles his cell phone from where he'd abandoned on the rickety IKEA table that holds his keys and loose change, and hits Erik's number on speed dial.

The phone barely gets past one ring before it clicks. Charles braces himself for the dead air of an empty line, or Erik's anonymous, computerized _You have reached – Erik Lehnsherr – please leave a message_.

"Hello?"

Charles swallows past his shock. "I – Moira?"

"Good morning, Charles," Moira says, in a vaguely sing-song voice. "Erik is indisposed right now, would you like to leave a message?"

"Why are you answering Erik's phone? Is he – is he okay?"

"Why am I currently doing secretary duty, you mean?" Moira's voice has an edge to it, but there's some humor to it, too. "Erik's fine. He's passed out on the couch right now, and he's going to have a hell of a headache when he wakes up, but yes, he's fine. He wouldn't go to sleep until I promised to pick up if you called. I'm not sure I would have agreed if I'd realized it'd be before eight am on my day off, but..."

Charles is split between relief and a still-lingering confusion and ... something else, he doesn't know what. "I don't – why are you at his place to begin with?"

Moira sighs audibly into the phone. "I'm not. Erik showed up at my door at midnight, drunkenly yelling at me about mutant representation in media and popular culture." Charles can't help but smile at that picture, sad as it is. Dryly, Moira adds, "I take it you two had a fight last night?"

Charles doesn't know how to answer that, but he's aware his silence is just as incriminating as anything he could say. 

Moira's voice is a bit softer – and Charles still isn't used to that, the voice of a Moira that is some kind of friend, not his boss – as she says, "Do you want to leave a message, Charles?"

"No," Charles says. "I just wanted to make sure he was okay. Sorry. I'll just – goodbye, Moira."

He hangs up before either of them can say anything else. 

The phone in his hand feels like a grenade about to go off. Charles stares at it fearfully, but it doesn't ring. It doesn't detonate.

He should call Moira back and apologize for brushing her off; she deserves better than that, but Charles has no idea if he can give it to her. At the very least, she deserves him telling her he'll have to change partners, or that he's decided to terminate his consultancy. Erik might – might – be able to work with him, putting the different Charles's in their respective boxes, but Charles knows he couldn't do it himself. He couldn't look at the blank professionalism of Erik's mind and know, locked away, is Erik's hurt and pain and hatred.

Sighing, he goes to toast the last of the waffles. Now that he has his keys, he should go out and shop. Shop for food he doesn't feel like eating, he thinks with a laugh, when all he wants to do is run and hide and never be found again. _Wallow_ , really. It's strange; his long mental jaunts have always brought difficult or frightening things into perspective, offered solutions even Charles's swift-moving mind couldn't generate. But now, on the other side of twelve hours of peaceful non-existence, he's as confused and heartsick as before.

_Maybe actual sleep will help_ , he tells himself, a reassuring lie to get him to do something other than stand in his kitchen, watching his toaster burn the waffles.

Once in bed, of course, sleep eludes him, hovering just out of reach. After trying and failing to capture it, he sends his mind out wandering through the labyrinth of the city, staying carefully away from the vivid blur of steel-grey grief and incoherent nightmares that is Erik's mind. He watches it from afar, the bright, purposeful dot of Moira's thoughts hovering around it like a firefly, and aches.

That way lies danger, though. He wanders further afield until he finds her, her presence like the phoenix in the drab beige and gray of student housing. _Jean?_ he asks the phoenix, half-expecting it to continue drowsing, which it's doing now, Jean not entirely wanting to wake up after long night of studying.

Instead, the phoenix shakes itself and bursts into bright awareness. _Charles? What's going on? You feel terrible._

Charles winces. It's an accurate observation, in more ways than one. _I don't suppose you want to go out for breakfast? My treat._

_Yeah, of course, just give me – hm. A half hour or so? Where do you want to go?_

He names a place, close to Jean's dorm. He could do with a long walk, anyway. It's certainly preferably to sitting around his apartment. Jean agrees, and he lets her mind fade away as she begins to get ready.

Charles has to force himself to get out of bed, too. He briefly considers, then rejects a shower, and finally throws on a sweatshirt and jeans and runs a comb half-heartedly through his hair. It's not quite as cold today as it was yesterday, from what he gathers from a cursory sweep of the neighborhood, so he leaves the hat and gloves behind as he leaves, locking up the place behind him. 

If the weekend had gone how it was supposed to, he would probably just be waking up right now, Charles reflects as he walks, hating himself a little for even letting the thoughts into his head. Erik would be back from his run already, and he'd be making blueberry pancakes – no, chocolate chip – and making up a tray to bring Charles breakfast in bed. He'd be doing it in that way he has where he's trying to be ironic about it, making fun of himself, but it doesn't take away the fact that he's doing the romantic gesture nonetheless. And then afterwards, they'd put the tray aside and Charles would be pulling Erik back on top of him, letting him lick the syrup from his mouth –

_Shut up_ , Charles thinks viciously. _Shut up, shut up, shut up_. The rhythm of the phrase in his mind matches the stomp of his shoes against the pavement. 

Jean is already there when Charles enters the restaurant, bell on the door clanging after him as he makes his way to the corner booth where she's waiting. 

_Hey_ , Jean says, giving him a sympathetic smile and a half-wave.

Charles winces. _That bad?_

_You're not projecting_ , Jean reassures him as he collapses onto the padded bench across from her. There's already a menu and a cup of coffee waiting for him. While he's not entirely sure he wants to be more awake than he is, the caffeine will help – even if, Charles thinks as he stirs in a generous amount of sugar, the smell reminds him of Erik's addiction to all forms of coffee. The coffee at home (at his place), diners, restaurants, the terrible break room coffee, it doesn't matter: Erik will drink it. Jean observes Charles's mental meanderings with a small smile. _Are you okay?_

_Not really_. A few other people in the diner have taken vague note that neither the pretty redhead nor the disheveled-looking boy have said anything yet, but some of them are too hungover to care and the others are students who are nearly unconscious after all-nighters. 

The waitress, already vaguely bored at the thought of another day spent waiting on college students, comes over to take their order. Nothing on the menu looks good, with Charles's stomach in the nauseating limbo between hunger and the sort of lack of appetite that makes anything look impossible to eat. He attempts to say just coffee is fine, but Jean makes an annoyed noise – "You've barely eaten since yesterday, Charles! And waffles don't count!" – so he caves enough for oatmeal with maple syrup and, after Jean pesters him about protein, bacon.

Once they've got rid of the waitress, Jean says _Did you want to talk about it? I mean, you don't have to if you don't want to..._

Charles does want to talk, and he wants to not talk. He settles for _I feel like... I fought, and I feel like I'm the one who fucked up, like I should apologize and explain and ask him to take me back. But I know what I said to him was right. And I know I can't..._ He can't bring himself to say the words so he messily wraps the words and the images and memories up and pushes them at Jean: his thoughts on moving in with Erik, a calm evening skewing sideways into a fight, Erik's jealousy, Charles terrified at the thought of being owned, controlled, leaving. Vanishing out of his head last night. _And now I don't... I can't talk to him. I don't want to know what he thinks of me._

Jean is looking at him in a way that immediately makes Charles wants to hide. This is what friends are for, he reminds himself. He doesn't _want_ to be damaged or alone for his entire life, so he has to – he has to let people see him. That's the bargain you strike with people when you let them into your life this way. That's how it works.

_I'm going to preface this by saying that I don't know Erik_ , Jean says carefully, _so I don't know how he feels or how he's going to react or anything like that. I just know what you've shown me before, how you've thought about him all these weeks I've known you. But just based on that ... do you really think he thinks that badly of you, Charles_?

Charles stares down at the tabletop. There's a crack in the corner, and Charles traces it with one finger. _I don't know_ , he says finally. _That's the problem._

He can feel Jean's eyes on him, sense her still searching for the right thing to say. And she's a bit surprised, that someone so comfortble with his telepathy could admit to not knowing someone the way telepaths are accustomed to knowing them. Maybe he shouldn't have put this all on Jean, after all. Jean grew up in happy family, middle-class suburbia, and even her relationship with Scott is practically perfect. They never fight, as far as Charles's seen. They're just ... calm, and comfortable. Charles wonders, vaguely, what that's like. Maybe the dullness is worth it, giving up all the sublime parts but missing this misery, too.

_I can hear you, you know_ , Jean says. _Don't be a jerk._

Charles looks up, eyes widening. _I wasn't –_

_You were_ , Jean sends firmly. She leans back against the seat, crossing her arms in front of her chest. _You were being condescending and douchey. Just because our relationship isn't a soap opera doesn't make it less important than yours._

"Sorry," Charles says out loud, biting his lip.

Jean sighs. "It's okay." She reaches out, a warm comfort thought, to let him know that she means it. "I think ... from what you said, it sounds like you're both really scared, Charles. And that's okay, but it kind of sounds like _neither_ of you are really thinking clearly because of it.”

He reminds himself that, despite the relative peace of their relationship, Scott and Jean have their tensions too. Scott's worried about Jean being back up in Annandale-on-Hudson for a month. It's not a huge distance, but it's enough when Scott has to work in the city over her break and she has her own friends from her hometown to hang out with. He's probably handling that anxiety better than Erik's handling his own, Charles thinks wryly.

_You'd be surprised_ , Jean says. _He knows my first boyfriend still lives there and he has this weird paranoid fantasy that I'll forget why I broke up with him in the first place._ She pauses, with the waitress appearing on the periphery of their joint awareness to deliver Charles's oatmeal and Jean's omelet. _But no changing the subject! You're afraid, but... but it's not just that, is it?_

_I'm angry_ , Charles admits. He pours an unhealthy amount of maple syrup into his oatmeal and begins to eat, mechanically at first, but with a bit more interest after the sugar sparks his appetite. _He knows I don't deal well with people trying to control me, and he tried to do it anyway! He knew that, Jean. And_, Charles swallows, biting his lip because he is not going to cry in the damn diner, in front of Jean, _he knows how much I trust him, that he's the only person I've ever trusted for so many things, and it's like... like it doesn't matter. That I'm going to just forget that._

Jean sighs, poking at her omelet disinterestedly. Charles hopes he hasn't projected his own lack of appetite on to her. Finally, though, she takes a mouthful of egg and green onion and says, "I only know a bit about him from you and Alex, but it seems... It seems like he's used to things he loves being taken from him."

"This is different, though," Charles argues. "I'm not going to be _taken_ , he thinks I'm going to leave him. If anyone tried to take me from him, I'd..." He doesn't entirely know what he'd do, although in the places he doesn't like to think exist, he's fantasized about what he'd do to Shaw if he ever found him. "But I guess," he laughs, ugly and self-deprecating, "I left. I fulfilled his fucking prophecy, didn't I?" He's suddenly, almost irrationally, angry about that: that if he'd capitulated and stayed, Erik would have won; by running, by _leaving_ , Erik's won as well. And Charles has lost both ways.

Congratulations, Charles thinks bitterly into the void. 

It strikes him suddenly that this anger, this burning inside him, is a lot like what Erik feels all the time.

Very gently, Jean says, "You weren't wrong to go. You have to do what you need to do for you. But ... that's the danger in any kind of always or forever promise, isn't it? No matter how much you mean them, you can't know for certain, one hundred percent, because the world can always surprise you. I can't totally disagree with that. You said you weren't going to ever leave, but then the situation changed, and so did your choices." She taps her fork thoughtfully against the side of her plate. "It doesn't mean you can't make the promises anyway, I don't think. It doesn't mean they're not worth anything. But I'm not sure that Erik's doubt was really about _you_."

Charles finishes the last of his oatmeal, and pushes the plate toward the center of the table. He can't find the right words to explain it to Jean, so he doesn't bother trying. He folds his arms and rests his head on top of them, closing his eyes.

He can feel Jean holding something back, struggling with some thought she doesn't want to share. Warily, he says, _Go ahead and say whatever you're thinking, Jean._

"Charles..." Jean says, sounding pained. "I just want you to be happy. "

"I'm not going to be happy without him," Charles says, muffled against his arm and fabric. Not for the first time – hell, not even for the first time this _morning_ – he wishes for a little less self-awareness. If he's going to feel this way, he'd rather not know how stupid and cliched he sounds, like a high schooler acting out _Romeo and Juliet_ without the least bit of critical thinking or irony. "But at least I'll be me."

There's a pause for a few moments. The waitress comes and takes away the empty dishes and refills both their coffees. When she's gone again, Jean speaks.

"I guess what I don't get is... From what you showed me, I'm not sure where he really asked you to change." Jean sounds uncertain, tentative, and Charles wonders vaguely if she's afraid he's going to turn his anger onto _her_. Kill the messenger. "It seemed like you were the one who brought it up, not him, that it was just him thinking to himself. I'm not as experienced as you with this, obviously, but isn't it dangerous for us to go on what people are thinking to themselves, not what they actually do?"

Charles lifts his head and starts to explain – the fact that Erik was thinking those things meant that it would lead to that controlling, that changing in the future, and he can't just sit around and wait for it to happen – but he cuts himself off in the middle with a sudden realization, one that he thinks Jean's been trying to guide him to in her own gentle way. 

Fear keeps us from seeing clearly, she'd said. Erik's fear was that Charles would move on; Charles was that Erik's going to hold him so tight it changes him; and they were both so scared that they were willing to jump ahead, skip over what they have to what might or might not ever happen. 

"He just..." Charles presses the heels of his hands against his eyes, not really expecting it to help him think. "He was so _condescending_ about you and Scott being my friends, and about how I want to start back at school. And he thinks..." Charles trails off as he forces himself to go over that disastrous conversation in his mind and the whirl of confused thoughts in Erik's head, the jealousy and automatic dislike, and underneath _Charles wouldn't like people who aren't worth his time_ , a tiny rational voice drowned out by Erik's instinctive panic. "Oh god."

"Erik doesn't like anyone," Jean reminds him with an arch look. "I mean, Alex usually just calls him 'that surly bastard Lehnsherr,' and they've known each other since Alex started working in Homicide."

That's true enough. Moira and Logan are the only people other than Charles Erik actually seems to enjoy being around when they're not at work. Everyone else exists on sufferance. _Still_ , the reproachful, bitter part of him says, _he should know better than to think that about my friends._

"I know you're going to hate me for this," Jean says, "but you should talk to him. And, even if it _is_ over," she adds, catching Charles's despairing thought, "you'll at least have said what you want to say. I'm sure it's not, though; you're both too stubborn."

"Stop making sense," Charles mutters. Jean's quiet laugh actually pulls a smile from him; after the tension of this morning and last night, it sits strangely on his mouth. It probably looks horrible, more like a rictus than anything else. "I didn't tell you, though... Last night I went away, you know?" He gestures to his temple, and Jean nods uncertainly; maybe it's not a coping mechanism she's ever had to develop, her telepathy being so new to her. "And I don't know if he came to give me my keys or what, what he must have thought when I didn't answer." Guilt wells up, hot and thick in his throat. _I could have been there, but I wasn't. He has no reason to believe me now, when I say I won't leave._

"Finding out what he thinks can't really be worse than sitting here imagining the worse, can it?" Jean says. "At least you'll _know_."

Charles's automatic reaction is to disagree; at least this way, he has the hope, even if most of him is convinced of the worst. But the more he thinks about it, the more he thinks Jean may be right. At least he would be able to stop torturing himself with possibilities. And Erik knows he does this. Erik's been there with him, watching over him in a way that Charles hasn't ever trusted anyone to do before. He tries to hang on to that thought, but his anxieties, everything else Erik could bring to bear against him, sweeps him away from the security it provides.

_If it were anyone else_ , he admits to Jean, a little ashamed of himself, _I might reach out and see. Normally I wouldn't violate someone like that, you know, but right now... I could do it. But Erik knows me too well. I can't hide from him._

Erik has, from the very beginning, seen Charles for all and everything that he is. It was terrifying the first night they were together, and it's terrifying now that they're apart. 

"You're right," Charles says. "I need to talk to him. I just need to build myself up to it, I guess."

Jean makes a face. "Any other time, I would volunteer to camp out in your apartment with you and offer chocolate and moral support, as long as you need me, but I have a paper due by seven am tomorrow..."

"I understand," Charles tells her. "You've already been really helpful, anyway." He smiles. "You're like a therapist I can't lie to."

"We know how that goes," Jean says. She frowns down at the cooling coffee in her mug.

Jean has her own dark spots, of course. She hasn't talked much about them, but Charles knows they're there anyway. They revolve around her telepathy, her parents' own attempts to ease what they saw as their child's pain by sending her to therapist after therapist while Jean struggled into some kind of control all on her own. He's deeply grateful they never heard of his father, and his father had never heard of Jean.

"What's your paper on?" Charles asks. It's a transparent attempt to change the subject, as much for Jean as for himself. He's going to have to nerve himself up to talking to Erik, and he might as well talk to Jean while he does so.

"I don't even know anymore," Jean groans. "It's _supposed_ to be about the representation of women in Shakespeare, but it's just words at this point. Usually I'm okay with books and even some poetry, but drama is so..."

"Limited?" Charles isn't very good at imagining characters' motivations or emotional states, not when he's got direct access to thoughts and feelings in the real world. Books that let him into characters' interior lives are easy for him; having to _infer_ , without even the minimal cues of gesture and expression, takes effort.

Jean nods and smiles. Her smile is lovely, sweet and open despite how quick she can be to sarcasm – or to anger, if she's riled. Charles has seen her argue down the most obnoxiously arrogant male students at parties and rallies. When she's angry, she burns with a dangerous flame that shines like a warning light, and even the people who want to persist in antagonizing her have the sense to back away. She and Erik, Charles thinks, might have more in common than Erik believes.

"Oh god," Jean laughs when she picks up on that thought. "I don't know if I should be honored or worried you're comparing me to your boyfriend."

"If he still is my boyfriend," Charles mutters. _But you should be honored, just so you know._

"He is," Jean says confidently.

"You don't know that," Charles says, but the truth is, Jean's certainty is a comfort he hadn't expected. As miserable as he still is, there's a small part of him, deep in his gut, that's beginning to at least think about untightening a little. 

Maybe the important thing is that – even if he left – he's coming back. Maybe – _maybe_ – the way to make Erik believe he'll stay is something that can only be done day by day, of Charles still being there. Each day it happens, maybe it'll be easier for Erik to accept that Charles is a very difficult person to get rid of.

"Weren't you comparing Scott to Erik, too, the other day at the coffee shop?" Jean says, looking amused. "Do you just sum up everyone you meet to see how they compare to him?"

"Of course not," Charles exclaims, but he can feel himself start to blush a little as he thinks it over a bit more, because there _is_ more than a small element of truth in what Jean's saying. "Whatever," he says to her tiny smirk. "It's just because he's the person I spent the most time with, and the most time thinking about. He's just..." Charles trails off. "He's just the center, I guess."

Jean's smile softens a bit into something else, something that looks suspiciously soppy, but she's nice enough to change the subject again. "Anyway, I started out the paper talking about Kate in _Taming of the Shrew_ , but I think that might have been a mistake. It's such a frustrating notion that it's hard to get past that to find stuff to talk about, you know? I just want to write five pages about how annoying the whole concept is, that a _difficult_ woman just needs a good, firm masculine hand to straighten her out, but that's not exactly college grade writing."

"Sexism is bad," Charles agrees solemnly. 

"Don't be an ass." Jean sends him the mental equivalent of a poke in the ribs. "Anyway, I have to finish _that_ tonight, and then get started on studying my stupid 'Alternate Assessment' biochem exam."

Ranting about the AA requirements for telepathic college students transfers some of his anxiety to another target. Despite confidentiality laws that protect a mutant from disclosing his or her mutation if they don't want to, telepaths are – as always – subject to a slew of restrictions and exceptions. Erik, of course, keeps a vigilant eye on the legislation and court battles, but it's something Charles is aware of every day, every time he has to pull out his Information and Disclosure card for witnesses and suspects. As soon as Jean had manifested, despite the limited extent of her telepathy at first, her parents had had to notify her school. The notations on her file will be in Charles's, when he starts school again.

Evelyn Russo is still a sore spot for him, like a bruise that aches whenever he thinks about her. Her rejection of him, however understandable, still hurts; maybe, Charles supposes, Erik's mistrust of Charles's permanence in his life came too close to having Russo so adamant about being out of his sight. Too close in time, too close in spirit. _You can't be trusted._

"It's _such_ a pain," Jean is saying, oblivious to the thoughts Charles is working through behind his shields. "My professor is just letting me take the same exam early, but my Calc prof is making me take a different exam from the one he's giving to the rest of the class. Like, because I can read minds, I'm _obviously_ going to cheat, when I can do the work myself faster. And get everything right."

They talk it out a little more, Jean piling on a few warnings for Charles about the bureaucracy of filing his paperwork with whatever university he goes to and accepting a few bits of advice on her Shakespeare paper in return. By the time Jean has to grimace at her watch and get back to work, Charles feels a little more stable.

_You'll be okay_ , Jean tells him as she pulls on her coat and wraps her scarf around her neck. She tugs her long, beautiful red hair free, shaking it out before pulling her cap over it. The way she says _you_ means not just Charles, but Erik too. _You'll be okay if you talk to him._

_I hope you're right,_ Charles says.

He walks her down to her subway stop, leaving her at the top of the stairs. He'd been tempted to stand there and watch her go, but he knows better than to be the person staying still, blocking the way on a city sidewalk, and so he keeps moving, vaguely in the direction of his own apartment, though not in any kind of direct route. The idle chatter of the minds all around him feels sort of peaceful, rather than the stressor it can sometimes be, and he lefts himself drift a little on the currents of everyone else's lazy Sunday as he walks.

He stops at the park a few blocks from his house. It's not as crowded as it often is, in this weather, but he's not the only one there, either. There are a few kids playing absently on the playground, a few old men playing chess over in the corner under some oaks. Charles sits down on one of the benches and takes his phone out of his pocket.

His screen is the generic default, but only because he uses it at work. It's a couple swipes of his finger to get to his pictures: Erik exasperated; Erik humoring him over another chess game; Erik giving finally one of his genuine private smiles. Charles and Erik together on the screen, Charles hanging half off his back as he holds the phone in front of them to take the shaky blurred photo. 

He's not ready to contact Erik using his power yet, but he can certainly be brave enough to use the phone. He hits Erik's speed dial again, remembering a second too late to hope that Moira's not still babysitting it.

But no – it's Erik who answers, in a groggy, breathless voice. "Charles?"

"Hi," Charles says. "I thought – I thought maybe we should talk. Is it okay if I come over?"

The silence that follows stretches on forever. Fear floods in to fill it and he can only think _that's it, no, he's going to say no, it's over_ , and think it so loudly he almost misses Erik actually talking.

"I... yeah," Erik says. Charles hears caution, wariness, relief, other things he can't examine too closely. "But – maybe later. An hour or so. I need to take a shower."

Along with that sense of treading on eggshells, Charles is pretty sure he can hear the hangover in Erik's voice. It has an edge to it like sharp gravel, dehydration and probably a lot of cigarettes. Erik won't take well to Charles pointing that out, so Charles just says, "An hour. I'll see you then?"

"Yeah," Erik says, soft and emphatic. He'll be there when Charles shows up, armored and ready for a fight – ready, Charles remembers one of Erik's metaphors, to walk across a minefield.

* * *

After the longest hour of his life, spent partly on a bus and partly in a park down the street from Erik's building, Charles knocks on the door to Erik's apartment. It's taken everything in him not to reach out to Erik to see what he's thinking, to assess the damage and his chances of repairing it, repairing _them_. He _wants_ to; being out of contact with Erik's mind for so long leaves his sense of the world off-kilter, like a leg's been kicked out from underneath it and it's struggling for a new center of gravity again.

Erik _is_ his center. He doesn't entirely know if Jean understands just how true his words to her had been. Erik's his center, and centers don't shift easily. At least, Charles's don't.

He hears soft footsteps on the other side of the door, and even without reaching out he can feel Erik's weary mind, guarded with tattered bits of wire, approaching.

"The door was unlocked," Erik says by way of greeting when he opens the door.

"I didn't... I didn't want to presume," Charles says. It's an effort to meet Erik's bloodshot grey eyes, and not to stare as he takes in the rest of him, his old NYPD t-shirt and black track pants, bare feet, a face that's still unshaven, which means Erik's not entirely certain of his powers' ability to hold the razor steady. That thought stings, and Charles finds himself wanting to stroke Erik's rough cheek to soothe away his own pain.

Erik steps back, leaving Charles to close the door and follow him down the hall into the living room. Charles takes his time peeling off his jacket and scarf, buying time to try and figure out where to begin. Erik sits down on the edge of the couch, watching Charles with a steady gaze that Charles can feel like a pressure on his skin.

Erik is the one who speaks first, though, as Charles finally comes to sit down a few feet away. "Moira told me you called this morning." His voice is even, unemotional, blank as his face is.

"Yeah," Charles says. "I wanted to make sure you were okay. I knew you'd been drinking last night, and then I saw that you had brought my keys over. I didn't know how you were holding up."

The briefest flash of a smile, aimed inwards, no humor in it. "I suppose you got your answer," Erik says. "Not well at all. But I can't knock it. The alcohol made it easier to remember not to try and call you, actually." He must see Charles's confusion on his face, because he clarifies: "It was killing me not to go after you. But I didn't want you to think I didn't respect your wishes, and even more than that ... I didn't want to make you feel unsafe. I figured the drunker I was, the more likely you were to feel that way."

Erik's the only person in the world Charles has ever talked to about what it was like those last few years with Kurt and Cain, before he left for school. It's not something he'd even discuss with Jean; as close as they are, their friendship doesn't run that deep, not yet. It wasn't, Charles thinks now, nearly as bad as it could have been. But it was bad enough.

Charles bites his lip and says, "I'm glad Moira was there to take care of you." He remembers Erik's statement yesterday, that Charles might have other things but Charles is all Erik has. It's not true. Erik has other people who care about him. 

Erik nods, but doesn't say anything in return. He's watching Charles so closely it's almost scary, like he's afraid if he looks away Charles might disappear. As if he can search out answers just from the minute details of Charles's expressions.

If anyone can do that, it's Erik. It's not only because he's an investigator. He knows Charles inside and out, better than anyone. Even angry as he must have been, he'd thought about Charles first – staying away, not chasing, not getting in his space and making demands. Even after he'd gotten drunk, he'd held to that. Even though that's the least anyone should expect from a person who cares for them, he's grateful – no, that's not the right word. It doesn't quite touch what Charles feels welling up in his chest.

"Thank you," he says softly, forcing himself to return Erik's gaze. "And I wanted to – " _apologize_ , but no, that isn't right, either. "I was wrong," he says instead. Erik sits back a little, a flicker of curiosity and apprehension Charles can't ignore. "I was wrong to assume you'd really try to control me, to smother me. You've never tried to, before. I shouldn't have expected the worst of you." Erik still doesn't say anything; Charles aches to look in on him, but it feels like cheating for some reason, and he still doesn't know if he wants to know what Erik's thinking, or what his reaction to Charles's next words will be. "But it... it hurt, listening to you treat my friends, the future I want, like it's – like it's not worthy, like it's a phase I'm going through."

He offers Erik what he hopes is a smile. "I'm usually a very deliberate person, Erik. I know what I want, and why I want it." And then, because he can't bear not talking to Erik properly, _You're the most reckless thing I've ever done, and I don't regret you. I can't._

It's like dipping a toe into a warm bath, feeling Erik's mind again. He can see the expression shift on Erik's face at the same moment he can feel Erik's consciousness begin to unspool out towards him once again. Erik was holding back with that, too, Charles realizes, waiting – _needing_ – Charles to make the first move. Now that he has, Erik can take a step forward, too. 

It's a little easier to breathe, suddenly. 

"I didn't intend to hurt you," Erik says, measuring each of his words carefully. His posture has loosened a little; instead of sitting tense at the edge, as if he's about to spring back up again, he's turned himself sideways on the cushion, his arm slung over the back of the couch. Charles watches the way his fingers trace the fabric in absent repetitive lines as he thinks. He looks like he still has something else to add, so Charles waits through the long pause before he speaks again. "I didn't really mean for you to hear those thoughts at all. I don't want to change you, I just..." Another wait; Erik stares at the ceiling for inspiration, and finally says, "I know I can't be everything you need to be happy. I know how ridiculous that would be. It doesn't prevent me from wanting that, sometimes."

When he says _sometimes_ , Charles is fairly certain he means _always_. "You have a life outside of me, too," Charles reminds him. "It's a good thing. And I need things outside of you for the same reason." He gestures vaguely toward his temple, waiting for permission before sharing a burst of impressions; Erik nods, and Charles sends him some of the feelings he's been having the last few weeks on the case, and especially after their arrest of Evelyn Russo. Not all of them, but an abridged version. "Without Scott and Jean and thoughts of school and everything else, I wouldn't know what to do with myself when you have your work to focus on. I don't want to be jealous of you doing what you do."

And then there's things like this morning, with Jean, too. Without her friendship, Charles wouldn't be here right now. He would still be locked up alone in his room, convinced the world was ending, that his life was over at twenty. He and Erik are good for each other, Charles doesn't doubt that when he can think rationally, but they're both on the more high-strung side of passionate; they both need people outside their relationship to remind them to come back down to the ground.

"You always say that people think things they don't mean; it's what people do that's important, whether or not they act on what they think," Erik says, sounding uncharacteristically hesitant. Charles nods to show he's got it right. "And having you all to myself, I want that but I don't _want_ it. If I had it – I wouldn't have you."

Through the tentative connection Charles has, he can feel Erik struggling to articulate what he means: having Charles's life revolve around him, nothing else in the world for him except for Erik, would mean not having _Charles_. He'd have something Charles-like, an approximation, but not that fierce, independent mind, or compassion, or arrogance, or stubbornness – or anything that makes up the constellation called _Charles Francis Xavier_ in Erik's head. Charles still can't quite make himself explore the depths of Erik's love for him; it's like looking into an abyss, frightening and tantalizing both at once.

"Are you angry with me?" Charles asks. Erik blinks quizzically at the change in subject, so Charles explains, "I... I left again," despite that being obvious, it still shames him to admit to his old, instinctive habit. "I did what you'd thought I'd do."

"I was," Erik says. He rubs the side of his face, as if to rub away a headache. Which, Charles realizes, is what he's doing; now that he's looking a bit more closely, he can see how Erik's ragged at the edges. "But I should have known better than to push like that, way past your boundaries. I can't be angry at you for that; I'm more angry at myself than anything." He pauses, adding, "If I'm angry at you, it's for assuming the worst of me. But I guess we're even there."

Charles breathes deeply and swallows, and hopes his relief isn't shouting itself across the city.

"Just to me, I think," Erik says, answering the thought. He reaches out his hand, winding his fingers around Charles's wrist like a bracelet, the way he always does, making Charles's pulse quicken when his thumb rubs gentle against his skin. "Come here," Erik says softly, and Charles lets himself be pulled in closer, until there's no space left between them and he's folded up, curled up across Erik's lap, head against Erik's chest.

_Are we okay, then?_

"I think so," Erik says. His mouth is pressed up against Charles's hair, and Charles can feel the warm puffs of air against his scalp as Erik speaks. Erik's hand is spread wide across Charles's back, a soft touch Charles can barely feel. "We're not perfect," Erik continues, "but I think we're okay."

Charles buries his face further against the cotton of Erik's shirt, worn incredibly soft from years of washings. _Do you think this means we should wait on moving in together?_ Charles asks uncertainly.

Another long pause from Erik. Charles aches at the carefulness, the necessity of it, though he doesn't resent it the way he once did. It's not Charles that Erik thinks is delicate, he realizes now; it's the whole world they have together that Erik's afraid he'll lose. Thinking it over, Charles realizes what it must cost him, balancing his struggle to hold tight with his knowledge that Charles can't bear to be held to the point of being held captive.

_If you're not ready,_ Erik says, falling back on their telepathic connection, _I understand. But my feelings about it haven't changed._

Charles can feel a smile forming on his face despite himself. That about covers it, both the best and the worst: Erik's feelings don't change very easily at all. Not for anything. 

Centers don't change, of course. Erik's convictions are bedrock, unshakable; so are his affections and, Charles knows, his hatred. Charles wishes Erik could see and understand how deep his own love runs, like a river carving out a canyon. What he feels for Erik is changing him, moment by moment, and it will keep on changing him. Sometimes Charles fears it; most of the time, he doesn't.

_I know you're old and set in your ways_ , Charles sends, a bit of teasing to lighten what he's going to say, _but I want... I want to know that you want me to move in because I love you, not because you want to get as much of me as you can before I leave._

Erik's sharply indrawn breath makes his chest surge under Charles, and Erik's arms tighten a little before, with conscious effort, Erik forces himself to relax. Charles looks up, straightening so he's more or less looking Erik in the eye. His eyes are cloudy with exhaustion, not their usual clear grey, and the fine lines at their corners, lines Charles loves to trace while they kiss, seem deeper than they should.

"I know," Charles winces a little; all the _I knows_ make him sound like the omniscient, bratty teenager Erik first met, "you're used to things, to people, you love leaving. But..." he frowns. _God_ words are inadequate; like ill-fitting shoes, they trip him up at inconvenient moments, making him limp awkwardly around what he wants to say. "Can I show you? I need you to know how much you mean to me, _what_ you mean. And why I won't leave you."

Erik says, "All right."

Charles closes his eyes, resting his forehead against Erik's. He brings one hand up to the side of Erik's head, brushing the still-damp hair away and stroking the thin skin of his temple.

_Erik_ , Charles thinks to himself, and he tries to let his mind go, tries to let out everything that name has come to mean to him, laying it all out there for Erik to see and feel and believe. There's no part of him that his love for Erik doesn't touch, like a tree that's magnificent in its own right, but with roots that go down even deeper, spreading and curling and wrapping around every thing that makes up Charles's self. It'd be impossible to ever tear it out, even if Charles, for some reason, wanted to. Even his memories, the bad years, have a slight tinge to them now, because he knows now he was waiting for Erik all that time, becoming the person who fits here in Erik's arms like a lock with a key.

Erik makes a noise, soft and surprised and full of wonder, and it's all Charles can do to hold back from closing the small space between their mouths and kissing him. Instead, he pulls back, letting his hand fall from Erik's face and his eyes blink open to take in the soft curve of Erik's lips, the warmth of his tired eyes. 

"You," Erik murmurs, shaking his head, "you. You are a perpetual astonishment to me, Xavier." It's Erik who gives in to the urge to kiss, then, pressing their lips together for a soft, sweet moment. Charles nips gently at Erik's lower lip when he pulls away, and Erik breaks off the kiss with a huff of a laugh. "Move in with me," Erik continues, a layer of calm over something almost giddy. "Not because I'm selfish and want you to myself, but because you love me. Share my life with me. We'll both do something reckless this time."

"Yes," Charles says, "yes, Erik, I want to – " and that's all he gets out before Erik is kissing him again, gripping Charles tightly, forcefully in the way that makes Charles feel a little like a heroine in a romance novel but that he can't help loving anyway, and whatever words are in Charles's head spark into something bright and wordless and relieved.

"I think," he says breathlessly, once Erik lets him up for air, "I should email my landlord and tell him I'm not renewing my lease. And figure out what I'm going to pack. Do you think Logan would help me move, if I got him beer? I mean, you could probably just levitate everything on a metal platform, but – "

"I think we should keep kissing," Erik growls. He nips Charles's neck, the sharp bite turning into a lazy nuzzle and Erik soothing the sting away with his tongue.

Charles doesn't have a problem with that in theory, or in practice. Erik sighs as Charles's mouth slots over his again, the first press of lips swiftly turning to something deeper, Erik's tongue stroking alongside Charles's, licking and tasting as if he doesn't already know Charles's mouth perfectly. It's only when Erik's big, lovely hands creep up under Charles's sweatshirt that, horribly, perversely – but necessarily – a half-articulated notion leaps to the front of his mind, demanding to be articulated.

"What?" Erik mutters. His eyes are already deliciously glassy, needing a moment to focus on Charles being so far away. "Charles, what – "

"I want to pay half of everything," Charles tells him. "Including rent, not just utilities and food."

Erik shakes his head. "Your salary can't possibly pay you that much, rent here is – "

"I sneaked a look over your shoulder when you were paying it one night." _Of course you did_ , Erik thinks very loudly. Charles pokes him. "The point is, I know what you pay, and I want to pay half of it."

"That means you'll have to use your trust fund," Erik points out. "Are you sure you want to do that?"

"I'll have to use it anyway, to pay for school," Charles says. It's times like this he's glad he can think fast, his mind racing along through thickets of complications and technicalities. "I'm not happy about that, but I won't be able to work full-time when I'm in classes anyway." He's glad that Erik absorbs the mention of Charles's future plans without a flicker of apprehension. "I still want to consult when I can, maybe over summer break. I mean," he adds with a smirk, "how you caught anyone before I came along is beyond me."

"I did okay," Erik protests, but it's just for form's sake; he's thinking through everything now as well. Charles watches the thoughts flicker through Erik's brain like pages in a flipbook. He never gets tired of observing the way Erik organizes the world, the firm way he builds his ideas like legos locking together. "All right. What else?"

"It's going to take a while for it to feel like our place," Charles says, "and not just me living in _your_ apartment, if you know what I mean."

Erik nods. He squeezes Charles's side, thumb rubbing over the bare skin beneath his shirt. "It'll help when all your stuff is here," he points out. He sighs before adding, "And maybe after we get you moved in, we could have some sort of ... I don't know, housewarming party. Have all your friends over."

"Seriously?" Erik's never been one for parties, or even visitors – Charles can remember him saying once, when they were first dating, that nobody had ever been in his apartment except for Charles and building maintenance people. Erik prizes his privacy, and his apartment is his sanctuary. It's part of that sharp divide Erik maintains between the world, with his work and other people, and himself, a separate space he guards fiercely.

Erik shrugs; he's making a slightly pained looking face, but Charles can feel his sincerity. "Like you said, it's going to be your home, too. And they're important to you. I need to get used to them, right?"

Charles can't help but beam at him dopily. He leans in for another kiss – and then remembers something else, pulling back almost immediately to the sound of Erik's frustrated groan.

"No, just wait," Charles says, resting his palms against Erik's chest. "It's about last night, when you brought me my keys."

"Okay," Erik says warily.

"It's not bad," Charles soothes. He runs his hand up to the sturdy bridges of Erik's shoulders. "I just... I saw the envelope, no note or anything – don't interrupt!" he says when Erik opens his mouth. "And I imagined you standing out there, knocking, and... and I didn't answer. What you must have thought." He isn't making much sense, Charles knows, but he hopes Erik understands what he's stumbling towards.

"I knew you weren't there," Erik tells him. He's touching Charles too, long strokes up and down his back. "Moira agreed to drive me over as long as I didn't make a scene," Erik scowls briefly. "I thought, as we were driving over that you had to have gone off out of your head, and I didn't like the thought of you there helpless, if something happened."

Stupid tears, Charles thinks, as Erik stops petting him to thumb moisture away from the corner of his right eye. "I wanted to go in to you, but Moira wouldn't let me. And I knew she was right; if I'd gone in, I wouldn't have been able to leave. I only unlocked the door to put the keys on the mat. But if you'd been awake – been there – I couldn't think of anything to say to you that wasn't...." his mouth twists, "something I'd have to apologize for. And I think Moira was thirty seconds away from handcuffing me and dragging me out."

"I might not have reacted well," Charles admits. It would have been disastrous, maybe; he'd been too strung out to deal rationally with Erik. Still, the thought he'd had that next morning, Erik outside, maybe trying to apologize, thinking Charles had cut him off completely... He burrows back in against Erik's chest, tucking his head back under Erik's chin, where it belongs. "But still, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you."

"Don't be sorry," Erik says. There's an edge of something in his voice that's not quite anger; it's not directed towards Charles, but Charles isn't sure exactly where it _is_ directed, because Erik doesn't know either. Erik tightens his grip around Charles's back, clutching him just as close as Charles is hanging on himself. "You needed to take care of yourself. You're here now."

_I'm here_ , Charles agrees, _and not going anywhere._

"Next time we fight – " Erik starts to say, and then, " – no, shush, listen to me," as Charles starts to argue in his mind, "don't be an idiot, Charles, of course we're going to fight again. And sometimes it'll be pretty bad, I'm sure. And I know you're not going to leave, but we both know you're going to want to, in the moment, so maybe... Maybe we can build that into it." Erik moves one hand from Charles's back to stroke absently at his hair. "Set up a codeword or something like that, and if you tell me that while we're arguing I'll know... that you need some time, and some space, and even to get out of your head for a while. But you'll come back, just like   
you did today, and we'll be able to talk it through for good."

"I don't want us to fight at all," Charles says quietly. "It's horrible."

"Not very realistic, though. Fighting doesn't have to mean we're breaking up," Erik reminds him. "And I can – I can deal with watching you leave, if I know you're coming back." 

The difference between a pause and a stop, Charles reflects. The difference between _I can't do this_ and _I can't do this right now_. It's all the difference in the world. 

He sighs against Erik's chest, nuzzling idly against the muscle and bone through the t-shirt. If Erik weren't still suffering the after-effects of his hangover, Charles would ask him to take him to bed. It feels like they've made a new start, promises and declarations that aren't empty or idealistic, but grounded in their experiences, how well they know each other, how much they're willing to try. Charles isn't sure it will feel completely real, though, until he's felt that tangible experience as well, their bodies connecting as beautifully as their minds can occasionally do.

_I didn't get you in trouble with Moira, did I?_ he asks. He's still not entirely sure what to make about their conversation this morning, and he hates that he might have opened Erik up to criticism. While Moira's shed a lot of her reservations regarding Charles and Erik being together, she's more than pragmatic enough to break them up if she thinks their relationship will interfere with their partnership.

Erik catches some of Charles's musings, carried along with his question as they are. _I think I was mostly in trouble for waking her up at midnight_ , he says. _We might have to talk to her tomorrow. She might want us to work separately for a while, which means she'll stick me with Emma as punishment._

The thought is dry and irritated, although with some of Erik's humor threaded through it. _I'll try to sweet-talk her out of it_ , Charles reassures him. _And I'll tell her my plans for the future. She should know as soon as possible._

_Whatever_ , Erik thinks dismissively. _We'll worry about her tomorrow. For now..._ His thoughts, like Charles's, trail off towards the bedroom and vague images of naked limbs and heat and sweat, tapering off reluctantly as Erik takes stock of his headache and exhaustion. "We've still got some time left today," he says, "and I don't know about you, but I need to sleep." _Couldn't sleep last night_ , Erik means, on Moira's tiny guest bed without Charles wrapped in his arms. "And then we could try for latkes again."

"And the menorah?" Charles asks, with a glance over to the glint of silver in the window.

"That too," Erik agrees.

The only problem with moving to bed is that first he has to climb out of Erik's lap; it's an effort to convince himself to do so, even knowing he's going to back in Erik's arms again in a matter of moments. Charles forces himself to unwrap his limbs from around Erik, and climb back off of the couch. Erik follows him, stopping in front of Charles to sneak another kiss, pulling Charles up on his toes for a moment before letting go.

"Go on to bed," Charles says. "I'll be there in just a minute."

Erik nods and disappears down the hall.

Charles unties his shoes and kicks them off, taking them in hand to go set in the stand by the door instead of leaving them on the floor by the couch. His jacket's still lying folded over one of the stools by the kitchen, and he digs out his phone from the pocket. He doesn't want to interrupt her paper writing – and, more than that, he doesn't want to bring a close to this moment of he and Erik in harmony by letting someone else in his head to speak – but he owes Jean some sort of check-in. A text, at the very least.

After a moment's consideration, he types out _You were right :)_ , and then sets the phone down to walk back to the bedroom and join Erik again.

Erik is undressing in the half-light of his bedroom. Even though he's just stripping down to boxers and his t-shirt, he's so beautiful Charles has to stop and look at him, like seeing him anew – or no, really, for the first time. The same goes for the bedroom, which will be Charles's bedroom too, with its practical metal appointments and the iron-framed bed that Erik loves because it cradles him and soothes him, and Charles loves for the same reason: because Erik loves it. Erik moves smoothly through the room, subtle, unconscious gestures pulling down the metal tab of the blinds, the corner light, before he slides into bed.

_Are you going to join me, or just stare?_ Erik asks, a bit impatient but mostly bemused.

For answer, Charles slides off his jeans and toes his socks off to join them. On any other day he'd make a show of it, turn around so Erik can appreciate his ass the way he ought, but today the space they've created is tentative, and strangely new, at the border between something good, but old, and something even better – something that's rapidly turning from possibility into reality. Charles needs the time to study it and let it settle into his bones.

He'll have time now, he thinks, anticipation shivering through him before it melts into calmness again. He tugs off his sweatshirt, has half a thought to folding it and his jeans and placing them on the chair next to Erik's things, but a wave of _come to bed_ from Erik forestalls that. He pauses by the edge of the bed for a moment, staring down at Erik, who stares up at him solemnly.

_I love you a lot, you know_ , he tells Erik seriously.

_I do know_ , Erik allows. And he _feels_ like he does, like the knowledge is stable – not something Erik hopes is true, or believes could be, or knows is true now and fears could change, but knows it for the absolute fact it is.

Charles knees his way across the bed, more than happy to let Erik reach out and pull him in close. He pulls the sheet and blanket up over both of them as Erik wraps his arms around him. Erik's body, as always, is relentlessly warm, and even warmer are his thoughts, the jagged edges of pain and hurt filed away, leaving only comfort for Charles to wrap himself in. Erik still burns, of course; his anger is still there, and it always will be – but it's tempered now, its heat unable to touch this moment.

Erik falls asleep quickly as his weariness overtakes him. Charles lies awake in his arms, his eyes closed, listening to Erik's steady breaths and stroking careful mental fingers over Erik's jumbled thoughts as his subconscious begins the process of trying to sort out itself from the day that's passed. This morning, and Charles's inability to fall asleep in his own bed, seem a long ways off now, like the other side of a divide. 

Eventually, Charles lets himself drift off, too, into a peaceful dreamless rest.

When he wakes again, a few hours later, he's alone in the bed, but it's still warm from Erik's body heat. Charles rolls over into the empty space, reaching out with his mind to find Erik, who is only as far as the next room. Erik feels agitated; Charles frowns, pushes a little more, far enough to sense that Erik's on a phone call. With Moira, and yes, it's about work. Charles fleetingly considers falling back asleep – surely it's nothing that has to be dealt with _now_ – but instead he sighs and gets up to see what it is.

"It's _ridiculous_ ," Erik is saying into the phone when Charles reaches the living room. "You know full well it's ridiculous, and so does Blaire, believe me – " 

He's standing up, a few feet away from the TV, scowling fiercely. Charles makes his way to sit on the stool by the breakfast bar, rubbing absently at his eyes to rub away the sleepiness. He gives Erik a questioning look; if anything, Erik's scowl only increases, and he shakes his head at Charles in a way that Charles interprets as him being disbelieving, once again, at the world's stupidity.

"Yes, he's here," Erik says impatiently. "No, but – fine. Fine. I said, fine, Moira, here he is." Erik huffs and crosses the feet between them, shoving the phone at Charles. Charles takes it and says politely, "Good evening, Moira. What's going on?"

Erik crosses his arms angrily, still standing in front of Charles, as Moira says, in a tired voice, "Russo and her lawyers are claiming you violated telepathic protocol. They're trying to get the entire case thrown out."

"What?" He'd slump to the floor if his body could actually move right now; he's locked in place with surprise. "I didn't – "

"I know you didn't," Moira says firmly. "But Blaire will have to convince the judge of that tomorrow; he's hearing the motion in the afternoon."

"Will I need to do anything?" He wonders wildly if this was Russo's idea, or if her lawyers came up with it when they realized a telepath had been involved in the investigation. He knows Russo is entitled to a vigorous defense, but this is _his_ reputation on the line – and more, the reputation of Emma, Jean, every psionic out there. It's Erik's, too, for working with him.

"You may need to talk to the judge." Moira makes an exasperated sound. "In fact, I can almost guarantee you'll have to. And," she blows out a breath, "you'll have to wear an ability-monitoring device while you're in there, Charles. They're going to want to be absolutely sure you're not influencing the judge. I'm sorry."

"What will this do to the case if they... if they think I manipulated her?" The questions come automatically; he's too shell-shocked to really be curious about anything. Of course he'll have to wear an AMD and fuck due process. Some of that must get through to Erik, because he swears softly.

"It'll be dismissed," Moira tells him, the words taking on a gentleness Charles has never heard from her. "With her initial confession to Erik void, the one she gave on record will be stricken. And there's no concrete evidence to tie her to the arsons, other than her work history. Blaire would have an uphill battle to prove it, and even if she could play on jury fears about mutants," which Blaire won't; she's a mutant, too, "she'd probably lose."

"So we're screwed," Charles says bitterly. "Because of me."

"Because of lawyers," Moira corrects. "If we lose this, Charles, it's not because of anything you did. Or," she adds, "anything that you are."

It doesn't matter how many times in his life people tell Charles not to take things personally; he suspects he's always going to. It's not about _you_ specifically. Just about everything that makes you who you are. Not exactly comforting.

But Moira is being kind, and Charles has to appreciate that, nonetheless. "Thank you, Moira," he says dully.

Erik has come close again, making impatient gestures towards the phone. "I'm going to hand the phone back over to Erik now," Charles tells Moira. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"All right," Moira says. "Take care of yourself, Charles."

He hands the phone to Erik, who immediately spreads out again, hissing upset and unhappy words into the line that Charles doesn't bother to parse, choosing instead to leave them as undifferentiated background noise. Erik's doing well at keeping his voice level even, Charles notes vaguely; at least he's not yelling at Moira, who doesn't deserve it at all.

After Erik hangs up, he walks back over to Charles, bracing his hands against the breakfast bar and leaning in, so he's bracketing Charles in, pinning him there, surrounded. It's the same comfort to Charles it always is, maybe a little more so, and he lets out a shaky breath, looking up at Erik's face.

"I'm so sick of this," Charles confesses. "All of it."

"I'm sorry," Erik says. He hesitates for a moment before leaning in, kissing Charles's temple. The significance of the gesture isn't lost on Charles, Erik's lips pressing against the pressure-point that triggers Charles's telepathy even now. His anger is bubbling up near the surface, anger on Charles's behalf; it's something Charles still has to struggle to accept, despite knowing it's one of the things he'll never be able to change about Erik. The purity of it is alloyed with something else, anger at Evelyn Russo. Erik makes a soft, affirmative noise when Charles mentions it. "I'm pissed that I did what I could to help her, and this is what happens."

Erik had given her contacts for mutant legal aid groups, Charles remembers. Despair pushes hard at the back of his throat as the implications of that sink in. "If it's other mutants calling telepathy into question, saying it's a threat, that'll... that'll mean other people," _baselines_ , Erik thinks contemptuously, "will feel justified fearing what psionics could do to them. And not just baselines – you heard Russo that night. She didn't want me there."

"I know, baby," Erik mutters. His fingers trace up and down Charles's arm, comforting more than arousing. "And I know you went by the book, like you have every time."

"They'll say I was _manipulating_ people then, too," Charles counters. He understands, suddenly, how easy it must be for Erik to keep the perpetual flame of his anger going. "They'll challenge all the cases I've worked on, won't they?"

"They can try," Erik says as he gathers Charles close. "It won't work."

As cynical as Erik is, and slow to believe in the goodness of things, his confidence in this shores Charles up. It's faith Erik might not be willing to examine too closely, but it's faith in himself (of course), and Moira, the other detectives they've worked with. And faith in Charles, which still overawes Charles sometimes, that Charles has enough strength of his own to pull through, but Erik will be there anyway.

"Before anything else shitty happens," Erik says dryly, "I should make latkes. Perfect comfort food."

"Yeah," Charles says, "that sounds good." He hadn't felt hungry before, but the mention of food seems to suddenly provoke it. "What can I do to help?"

"You can sit and watch, just like you always do," Erik says. He pulls away with a last stroke along Charles's back, and Charles watches as he makes his way into the kitchen.

"I prefer to think of it as supervision," he tells Erik, as Erik begins to gather ingredients.

On another night, he'd be thrilled at the sight, watching Erik manage the peeler and grater for the potatoes, the knife for the onions, the heavy cast iron frying pan all at once, all in different rhythms, like a complicated dance. Tonight he finds it a little calming instead, concentrating on the ease and the familiarity of it all.

The mixture looks lumpy and watery and pale when Erik's done combining the ingredients, and Charles gives it a doubtful look, but when Erik drops a spoonful into the hot oil it makes a promising sizzling noise, and a little while later, an appetizing smell.

Erik places the first two pancakes on a plate in front of Charles, along with sour cream, applesauce, and a salt shaker.

"I like it better with sour cream, but my mother preferred applesauce," Erik says. "Try it both ways and see which you like better."

Charles studies the pancakes for a moment, golden all over with darker, crisp edges. He's a bit dubious about the applesauce, so he spoons on a bit of sour cream first, sprinkling it with salt. There's no way to miss the edge of anticipation from Erik, with memories dancing around the margins of it: Erik grating the potatoes and silently dying of boredom, knowing better than to protest, the mouth-watering smell of the onions in hot oil and his mother warning him not to burn his mouth on the hot pancake when she pulls the first one out of the pan to drain.

_It'll still be there in a minute, when it's had the chance to cool_ , his mother would say, but Erik – being Erik – would sneak a too-hot bite anyway, the cooling sour cream not quite enough to offset the burn.

He takes his own bite now, crunching through the outer layer, the oil, salt, and tang of the cream all running together on his tongue. The taste reminds him he hasn't eaten since his inadequate breakfast, and he takes another quick bite, torn between savoring it and wolfing it down so he can have some more. The next pancake, this time with applesauce, is just as good, the hint of salt on and in the pancake setting off the sweet apple.

"I take it they meet with your approval?" Erik asks, dry as ever but with pleasure sparking bright in his mind as he prepares his own pancakes, with a generous dollop of sour cream on each one.

"Hmmm," Charles hums. "But I'm not entirely sure which I like better, the applesauce or sour cream, so I should probably have at least two more. For science."

"Oh, well," Erik says, "if it's for science..." and he turns away once more towards the hot stove while Charles waits.

Two more turns into four, and then six, until he's stuffed full and forces himself to set down his fork. Erik's already finished his own, and he's sweaty, hair mussed from his vigil at the stove, the smell of the frying oil still vaguely clinging to him as he sits. Charles comes around to stand behind him anyway, wrapping his arms around Erik's neck and resting his head atop Erik's. Erik leans back lightly against him.

"We still have a couple hours left of our weekend," Charles says. "Before everything else gets in the way again. What should we do with it?"

"I thought it was supposed to be about whatever _you_ wanted," Erik says. There's a shade of apology in the background that Charles doesn't pursue; whether it's about their fight or about the outside world of work interfering with Moira's call, it doesn't really matter. They've already discussed the former, and the latter... Time enough for that tomorrow, if Charles can manage to push it away for a little bit longer.

"Well," Charles says thoughtfully, "maybe what I want right now is to do something that makes you happy, too."

"Hm," Erik says, twisting a little in his grip, so he can look Charles in the eye. "What were you thinking? Doing the dishes and mopping the floor?"

"Sure," Charles agrees. "And then we can write angry letters to the editor for all your newspapers, and iron your suits, and maybe I can sit around and watch you take apart and reassemble your metal paperweights a few times."

Erik's mouth is quirked, fighting a smile. "You make my life sound pretty exciting."

"Writing letters to the editor of _Baseline Watch_ is very stimulating, I'm sure," Charles says solemnly. "Or I could find a maid uniform somewhere and run the vacuum a few times..."

"Brat," Erik grumbles. "Since you mentioned doing the dishes..."

"You know I will." It's their routine, now – strange, Charles thinks; they have a _routine_ – and Erik cleaning the last of the sour cream off his plate with his final bite of pancake is Charles's cue to collect their plates and glasses and start the washing-up. "You know," he says as he carefully drains the oil in the pan into a plastic container, "the whole point of having a dishwasher is that it _washes_ your _dishes_ for you."

"My mother always..." Erik trails off, the nostalgia that's hung around him all evening strengthening suddenly, memories of lectures ringing in his head clear as day. "We had a terrible dishwasher in our house. She never trusted it to do the job properly. For Pesach we would use her wedding silver and china, even if we weren't hosting seder that year. The same for the other holidays. The silver and china never went in the washer. When I got old enough to help beyond accidentally warping the flatware, she still washed it all herself."

Erik's emotions have the same complicated mix of love and pain they always have when he talks about his mother. Charles refrains from pointing out this dishwasher is maybe five years old, and probably a lot better than something from the 1980s. Instead, he washes the plates and flatware and installs them in the dishwasher, sets the pan to soak in hot water and detergent. Erik (even for Erik) is remarkably tidy as a cook; everything else is already in the washer or cleaned and put away. Charles cleans the stovetop for form's sake as Erik continues to meditate, halfway between memories of his mother on special days – Passover, Erik's birthday, Hanukkah – and now, the beginnings of new traditions, softer regrets that his mother couldn't know Charles.

Charles washes off the sponge and places it in its basket to drain.

"Should we – I mean, is it time to light the candles now?"

Erik glances over to the windowsill, where the menorah's sitting. The sun has set already, this close to winter, but it's not fully dark outside, with all the lights of the surrounding buildings and streets. "Yeah, now's as good a time as any," Erik says. "Come over here."

Charles follows Erik across the room. Since he's cut down so much on smoking, Erik no longer carries a lighter on himself at all times, but there are still ones scattered through out the apartment, what with small metal objects being one of Erik's few exceptions to his clutter-free existance. One of them floats over to them now. 

"You light the middle candle," Erik says, demonstrating as he does so, "and then that's the leader." He picks up the lit candle and hands it carefully to Charles. "Now use that one to light the others. Three for tonight."

Charles lowers the flame to the wick of the first candle, then the second and third. He's conscious of Erik's eyes watching him, the soft glow of Erik's memories of doing this with his mother, and even beyond that, the sense of ritualized purpose that Charles only manages to feel once in a very great while. 

When he was first living alone, he used to go to religious services more often. Not because he believed – he doesn't, really, at least not in a way he's seen reflected in any organized religion – but to chase more of this feeling, by setting himself in the middle of so many people all reaching for the same thing. He'd stopped eventually, when he'd realized that as thrilling as that sensation could be, it made him sadder in the long run. For the people who were feeling it, it had the effect of uniting them together, into a community, whereas Charles was nothing more than a hanger-on. It wasn't for him.

This isn't for him, either, in the wider sense – he's not Jewish, and going through the steps of lighting these candles isn't reminding him of a shared religion, a shared history, anything that a holiday is really meant to do. But... he and Erik are their own community now, maybe, in a way, and he can share this experience with Erik, be a part of it and what makes it so meaningful for _him_.

Erik gazes meditatively at the candles for a while, studying their own light and their reflections in the window. The golden glow they send up seems to darken the city beyond, so it's only Charles and Erik in their apartment, in a sea made of darkness and occasional points of light. He's holding Charles loosely, a hand resting on his hip, his body the suggestion of a sturdy weight against Charles's side.

"It's been a long time since I've thought of myself as Jewish," Erik says softly, and Charles looks up at him sharply, a little astonished that Erik's addressing his unspoken thought. "Or, I suppose, thought of myself as practicing. I had a girlfriend in college, Magda," he pauses, pushing a question at Charles; _yes, I remember_ , Charles tells him, "and she tried to get me to go to services, to observe the holidays... She never understood why I didn't and I could never explain it to her. I was never religious as a kid; I went because it was important to my mom, and if it was important to her, it was the same for me."

That's Erik's theology, Charles figures, the beginning and end of it, from decrees on the dishwasher to Shabbos services. Erik's mind isn't connecting this moment to his childhood memories of religion, or even to the small community of Jewish families that made up his neighborhood in Queens. This moment skips all those and goes back to this same menorah on a different windowsill, and Erik hesitantly taking the shamash from his mother's fingers to light the candles, one, two, three.

_I did like the story, though_ , Erik adds, sounding oddly reflective. _The oil for the lamps in the Temple lasted for eight days, until new oil could be brought._ It hadn't made sense to the literal-minded teenager Erik had been, but part of him had responded to it anyway, the sense of a people struggling to survive finding a symbol of their survival in such a small thing as a light that refused to be extinguished.

Charles wonders if there's anything to say to that. Maybe there isn't; it's the kind of thought that's complete in itself, that doesn't need any acknowledgment. Still, he leans up to kiss Erik gently, nothing demanding, although Erik takes it a little deeper. A faint hint of apology colors the kiss, Erik thinking how he's exhausted tonight, he's not sure if he's good for much, but that's fine; Charles mostly just wants to curl up on the couch and watch the candles for a while before going to bed. He won't be able to forget what's going to happen tomorrow, but just being around Erik, his complete immersion in whatever moment he's in, will help.

_Let's do that, then_ , Erik suggests, kissing Charles again. _I think there are some awful videos you wanted to finish watching._

_Being quiet's okay too_ , Charles tells him, and pokes Erik in the ribs when Erik thinks _oh, thank fuck_ more loudly than he should have.

They arrange themselves on the couch, Charles tucked between Erik's legs, his back to Erik's chest as they half-sit, half-lie. Erik's arms are tight across Charles's chest, laced together over his rib cage, and Charles rests his head back against Erik's shoulder. Charles is still in his shorts and undershirt, never having bothered to get dressed again after waking up from their nap, and he considers getting up to grab a blanket – but Erik's apartment is relatively warm, and so is Erik himself, and Charles finds himself unwilling to do anything that would mean they would have to stop touching each other, even for just a few second. There's too much comfort in this, skin on skin, the constant reassurance that they're still here, still unbroken. No matter what else happens – tomorrow or even further out than that – they have each other.

Erik's thoughts are muted; he's trying to avoid thinking of work tomorrow as well, but as good as he generally is in shoving things aside into their own separate boxes, his mind's too busy right now to drift off, and he's having trouble finding a topic to replace it with.

_Whatever you do, don't think about pink elephants_ , Charles tells him. He can't see Erik roll his eyes, but he knows it's happening, nonetheless.

Charles smiles and brings up his hand to lay atop Erik's where they're still steady against his chest.

He can sense when Erik's mind begins the slow descent from calm and quiet into drowsy, but he waits until Erik actually allows a yawn to escape before giving in and beginning to disentangle himself. "Come on, old man," he says, pushing himself up off the couch and offering his hand to help Erik up. "Time for bed."

Bedtime is another routine, the silent easy negotiation of the bathroom and bedroom: brushing their teeth, setting out clothes for the morning, and (in Erik's case only tonight) undressing for bed.

They slide into bed together, Charles on _his_ side and Erik on his own, although sides really don't matter when Charles gravitates over to Erik anyway. Erik's arms close around him, strong and steady, and hold him tight while Charles drifts in search of sleep.


	4. Chapter four

He wakes the next morning to the immediate knowledge of what's waiting for him today, a heavy weight in his stomach like solidified dread. Erik's still holding him, his mind sparking bright with awareness; he's awake, and by the feel of it, has been for a while.

_You're worried_ , Charles sends. He doesn't struggle out of Erik's hold; if anything, he burrows tighter. This sort of thing is what he meant last night, when he said he was tired. It's been hell enough surviving on his own; adding _this_ into it, whether it's Russo's sincere belief or an excuse manufactured by her attorneys, is nearly too much to bear.

_About you_. Erik tightens his grip around Charles's waist, folding himself around Charles more securely. _I know you hate it, but you're going to have to put up with it today. Blaire will do what she can. Moira and everyone else will have your back. I'll have your back_ , Erik says this fiercely, a conviction that burns bright like the candle flames last night. _But I hate that this is shit you shouldn't have to take. I'm going to be pissed about that for a while._

Charles isn't entirely sure if he'll ever get used to Erik being angry on his behalf, or Erik being worried. He knows he'll have to accommodate it at least... and, he tells himself, it will _help_ , knowing that he'll have Erik to rely on, his stubbornness and unwavering support in the back of Charles's mind while he talks to the judge. This isn't something he can do alone. He'll need Erik to get through it.

_Shall we then?_ Charles asks resignedly. As if on cue, Erik's phone alarm goes off, and the day begins.

If he thought they could do it without anything frisky happening, Charles would ask Erik to shower with him, just to gather up that last scrap of comfort that comes from Erik's surrounding him. As it is, he gives himself a little extra time under the hot water, and then some more to take care of his face and hair. The clothes he's picked out for the day are nicer than what he usually wears. He has to make a good impression today, after all. Convince a stranger that he's smart and ethical and honest, all while wearing a device that makes him feel like those party games where you've been blindfolded and then spun around three times. 

He grabs a banana from the fruit bowl and eats it in the car on the way to the station, while his free hand checks his phone. A congratulatory text from Jean, a few impersonal emails; nothing important, urgent or distracting.

Erik parks the car in his usual spot. He unbuckles his seat belt and then hesitates for a moment, before leaning over and pecking Charles on the cheek. He pats Charles's hand gently as he pulls away and says, "Come on, then," as he turns to get out of the car.

Charles smiles, despite everything, and follows Erik into the building.

They meet Logan at the elevator; he and Erik takes the opportunity to get into a conversation that sounds for all the world like a fight, but isn't – Charles can tell from both their minds how much they're enjoying it. Charles's input isn't particularly required, and it gives him some time to ponder about the talk he has to have with Moira.

He's been planning on it since before the news last night, but he can't say that this hasn't had a significant effect, too. As much as he was ready to start thinking about school before, he's even more eager for it now. He loves working with Erik, and he loves certain parts of the consulting process, but... it's that same tiredness he's mentioned to Erik. He feels run-down with it. This frustration with Russo's case isn't the cause of it, but it's another piece to add to it, weighing him down.

Erik, in the same position, would react differently, he knows; Erik would take the anger from this and it would just make him work harder, cling even tighter to the job, just to _show_ everybody. And Charles understands that, he does – he thinks he's even been in that same place before – but at the same time...

He doesn't feel like he has to prove anything to anybody, at least not with this job. Least of all himself. Maybe that's something that this fight this weekend has given him, when it forced him and Erik to have those conversations.

"Blaire's breathing fire," Logan says, apparently idly, but Charles knows him better. Erik snorts and replies with something that makes even Logan raise his eyebrows. It doesn't deter Logan, though, who continues on, "Press is starting to pick up on it, all-mutant case and all."

_Shitshow_ is what Logan means. Erik stews in furious silence, his mind twisting with anger at Evelyn Russo, the system, her attorneys, the system again – and anger for Charles, being caught in the middle of it. He's confident Charles will handle whatever is thrown at him, handle it and come out stronger than before, but it doesn't diminish his anger that Charles has to go through it anyway.

There's no point in waiting, once they get off the elevator. Charles turns for Moira's office – he can feel her in there, her mind buzzing with annoyance and work – and sends a _I'll see you in a bit_ to Erik, who responds with _you'll be okay, Charles_ and a rush of fierce pride and affection that Charles isn't used to experiencing in the office. It knocks him off his stride a moment, but in a good way, and once he's recovered it bolsters him, another bit of armor to add to what he needs to get through his day.

Moira looks up when he appears in her door, a tired but sincere smile on her face. "Charles, come in," she says, gesturing to the chair across her desk.

She waits until he's made himself comfortable, watching him in her usual quiet, self-contained way. Even as hectic as her day is right now – Charles can see files for the Russo trial on her desk, a few other active cases by her elbow – her mind clicks along regularly, like a train powering ahead over railroad ties. While he doesn't allow himself to read her very deeply, he gets the sense that she's confident in his ability to make a case for himself – less so for the judge's competency to rule on something as difficult as telepathy, but she knows Charles won't collapse, won't let the department (or Erik, more importantly) down.

"You'll be seeing the judge just after lunch," Moira tells him. "Allison's set aside some time later this morning to talk you through what you can expect. But," she inclines her head, taking his measure, "I don't think you're here to talk to me about that."

"No," Charles admits. "It's about my consultancy."

He tells her, a bare-bones version of the conclusions he's come to over the past few months. He tells her a few of his plans for the future, how Erik figures into them – how they're moving in together, which earns him a raised eyebrow – and, in a rush of honesty, why he feels his work might jeopardize the department's reputation.

"You let me worry about that," Moira tells him. "If you ever did anything to compromise this department's virtue, I'd let you hear about it."

Charles believes her, deep down in his bones; if there's one thing he knows about Moira, it's that she wouldn't allow anyone to get away with crap, and that's true no matter what their personal relationship is and how much she may like them. Still, even knowing that as he does, it doesn't really change the way he feels.

"It's not just that," Charles says. "It's just – as much as I've loved working here, as much as I've learned..." He trails off, raising his hands in a helpless gesture.

Moira sighs, tapping her pen against her desk. "To tell you the truth, Charles, I'm not entirely surprised. I'll be sorry to see you go, but I've been wondering how long it would be before you outgrew this position." 

Moira has a way of looking at people that makes you feel _seen_ , noted, observed, in a manner other people's glances don't. Like you've been pinned down and categorized and known, despite yourself. It's a little spooky, Charles thinks, especially knowing she doesn't have any mutant abilities helping her.

Charles lets out a breath and manages a smile for her. The dread for the rest of the day is still powerful inside him, but the small weight of this conversation has been lifted, at least. "I'll let you know when I've figured out more details about my school plans, and we can go from there."

Moira dismisses him and he heads back out onto the floor, back to Erik.

* * *

The Ability-Monitoring Device is half defensive tool, half badge of shame. It's a relic of the not-so-long-ago times of registration and testing, the public movements that would have put an AMD on every mutant out there – and gone a step beyond and turned them into shackles, blocking a mutant's access to his or her abilities. And then, from there, genetic re-engineering, "cures" and therapy like the kind practiced by the Hirschfield Institute.

Charles fights to remind himself, as a court officer takes him back to the room where the AMDs are kept, that this is being done with his consent. That bit of false logic had called up a torrent of anger from Erik back at the precinct; it's why he told Erik to go to court separately, because he doesn't know if he could handle his own fear, Erik's rage, the dissecting gazes of the attorneys and the judge, the questions. He could have refused, of course; the AMD was a request by the defense, not the judge, but refusing to put the device on might have been read as wanting to influence the judge – not by showing the judge he's a tame and helpful telepath who wouldn't never hurt a soul, but _influencing_ her the way they say he'd influenced Evelyn Russo.

He also has to fight to remind himself he's not back in his father's lab when the officer pulls the AMD out. It's one specially made for telepaths – Charles can hear the officer thinking this just before he shores up his shields, and wants to laugh. There's no such thing as _specially made_ ; every telepath is different. Charles's AMD is a strange hybrid of Bluetooth headset and medical device, with an electrode the officer attaches to Charles's temple. The signal feeds two ways: one, into an awkward little recorder the officer gives Charles to put in his breast pocket, and another to the court's shielded security station. Charles's recorder will beep if his neural activity spikes past a certain level; there will be no way to keep anyone from knowing that he's accessed his telepathy.

Shielding so tightly leaves him achy and disoriented. It keeps the recorder on his chest silent, but Charles finds himself waiting for it to go off like a bomb on silent countdown. He breathes deep and nods cooperatively when the officer reminds him not to scratch the electrode; he'll have to report back to the security station afterwards to turn the unit back in.

_You can get through this_ , he thinks within the muffling confines of his own head. The itch at his temple calls up all sorts of memories, none of them good. _Think about now. Only now. Think about the case. It's up to you to save it. Don't let Erik's work go to waste._

The officer says his name loudly, with the sort of intonation that suggests that Charles already missed the first and perhaps even second call.

"Sorry," Charles says, blinking up at him. "I'm ready."

The judge is waiting in her quarters, seated at a large desk, a few papers in front of her – his and Erik's reports, Charles assumes, along with whatever statement Russo's made. The room is full of dark, aged wood, bursts of rich colors or polished metal. It's designed to be intimidating, Charles thinks, reminscient of everything that shouts power and authority, though more than anything it just reminds him of the house up in Westchester. While it might not be intimidating as such, it's its own source of discomfort, especially with the renewed feelings the AMD is trying to pull up despite Charles's best efforts at ignoring them.

Charles hasn't worked with Judge Conroy before, in the months he's been on the job. Erik has a mixed opinion of her, respect tinged with frustration; Moira thinks she's tough but fair. She's a stickler, either way. 

Charles reminds himself again: _you didn't do anything wrong._

They start by going over the details of the arrest. Yes, Charles recognized her mutant status immediately. No, he didn't share that information with Detective Lehnsherr. Yes, he disclosed his telepathy when asked. Yes, he immediately provided Russo with information regarding his mutation and her rights. He stopped participating in the questioning on her request, and he left the room entirely when she followed up.

"Were you still in communication with Detective Lehnsherr after you left the apartment?"

"I remained in contact with him," Charles says. He has to be careful here; Conroy is going to leap on any misstep. It also requires him to explain some of the technicalities of telepathy, which rarely goes over well. "I was not actively communicating with him, but I wanted to remain aware of the situation, in case I needed to call for assistance."

"You did not feed information to Detective Lehnsherr in any way?" Conroy asks, looking at him over the rim of her glasses. The skepticism he hears nearly crushes him.

_No, you need to get through this. You can't screw this up._ Charles forces himself to look straight back at her, not defiantly or innocently, none of the masks he's used to skate by with authority figures before. He's not entirely sure what's on his face, only that it has Conroy sitting up a little, taking notice of him in some way she hadn't been before.

"At that point in the questioning, Detective Lehnsherr had established a rapport with Ms. Russo. That was _not_ because I gave him information on her outside the scope of my permit, it's because he's a gifted detective. He ascertained Ms. Russo's mutation for himself, and he was able to use that to earn her trust. That," Charles prays Erik will forgive him for this, if it ever gets back to him, "and he was able to empathize with Ms. Russo. He understood, intuitively, what might have driven her to do what she's alleged to have done – and beyond that, he sincerely wanted to help her."

"I see," Conroy says. She absently touches one of the papers on her desk – probably, Charles thinks, the Motion to Dismiss. He reminds himself this is one of those times that he shouldn't go looking for answers, in case whatever he finds in the other person's head isn't something he wants to hear. "You make a very... forceful case for your partner, Mr. Xavier."

"He's a good detective," Charles replies. "A good detective with a spotless record. That motion," he indicates the paper on her desk, "would malign him and his work as much as it would malign my ethics."

"And cast any of your cases currently at trial into doubt," the judge says dryly. "You've brought three cases, including this one, before the court, and solved three more without arrests due to extenuating circumstances. All cold cases, and all in a year. That is nearly unheard of."

"And not due solely to my telepathy." Briefly, Charles wonders if she's channeling the defense, has to remind himself it's her job to ask these questions. "Our interviews with witnesses and people of interest were only a small component in a much larger whole."

"The statement of abilities you submitted to the department said your cognitive levels and memory are 'significantly higher than standard.'" Conroy adjusts her glasses. "Some would say, 'off the charts.'"

"Which allows me to ascertain patterns and connections in old evidence, much faster than average," Charles agrees. "But that doesn't require mind-reading. And, Your Honor, I believe Detective Lehnsherr, given time, would have developed those connections himself. Without looking at that evidence, it would have been impossible for us to conduct the interviews we did. And it would have been impossible for the results of those interviews to hold up in court, given that information gleaned directly from telepathy is still inadmissible – and no ethical telepath, or a telepath who knows how memory works, would rely on it."

Conroy leans back a little. It's not defensive, Charles tells himself, but curious; what he's said has surprised her.

"Memory is very... fickle," Charles tells her. He keeps his tone neutral, professional, and reminds himself now is not the time for a lecture or to sound enthusiastic. "People mis-remember things all the time, or suppress certain key parts of a memory. They can also tell themselves the reality of a situation is false and substitute in a reality they prefer – denial, if you will – and over time they can come to believe their own 'reality' is true. That uncertainty requires a much larger evidentiary record to fall back on, and a context that helps me – I mean, the telepath – interpret the thoughts or memories witnesses consent to let me read. And," Charles shrugs, "sometimes witnesses remember a key piece of evidence, but they don't realize its significance. When Detective Lehnsherr and I interviewed Madeline Lockwood's daycare instructor, she remembered Maddy always carried a stuffed hippo, but thought it wasn't important it all. It was actually crucial to our subsequent determination that she had been abducted by someone who knew her, or wanted to keep her quiet long enough to get her out of the house."

"Hmm." Conroy studies him over the rim of her glasses. Charles's not very good at reading faces, not much better at voices, but he thinks she seems thoughtful. Not convinced, but perhaps a bit less skeptical than she was at the beginning of their interview. 

Conroy is silent for a minute, as she reads over her notes again; Charles does his best not to fidget, not to appear impatient or worried. Calm, but not arrogant, he reminds himself. Competant, but not snotty. Find that balance and stick to it. 

"Given that," Conroy says finally, "what affect would you see your telepathy had on this arrest?"

"On the arrest itself?" Charles asks. "Very little. Everything that happened at Russo's apartment can be put down to Detective Lehnsherr's skills. The only way mutation comes into it at all was through the connection he was able to form with Russo through their similar abilities. My main contribution that day was to be there as back-up in case he needed assistance of any kind. If you mean the case in general – as you brought up, my cognitive skills and memory are highly developed, which allowed me to help make connections with the evidence we had that did eventually lead us to Russo as a suspect."

Conroy examines him, stern and thoughtful, in a way that makes Charles want to wince a bit. It's probably one of the things that makes her a good judge, if she's able to do that, even when you know you didn't do anything wrong.

"As far as I am able to tell," the judge says, "there is no way to prove one way or another whether you influenced Ms. Russo. You certainly had the ability to do so, even after you were physically separated from her. However..." The judge pauses. "Given your track record over the last year, as well as the fact that the defense agrees with the physical actions you took matching the criteria for telepathic consultants, I'm inclined to refrain from dismissing the case. To allow that because you _could_ do, that means you _did_ would seem to be grounds for shuting down the telepathic consultant program entirely, and that is not within my scope to decide."

It takes everything in him not to slump or sigh with relief, although Charles very badly wants to. Numb, he watches as Conroy scribbles her signature on a piece of paper – for her clerk, maybe, to indicate the motion has been rejected, but he doesn't dare look – and shuffles a couple of other papers around. After a moment she looks up, blinking at him behind her thick glasses as if she's surprised to see him still sitting here.

"You can go now, Mr. Xavier," she says, not unkindly. She nods at the AMD. "I expect you'd like to get that off."

"Thank you, Your Honor." Charles makes himself stand smoothly, collectedly, professionally, not stumbling all over himself the way he wants to do, his limbs made clumsy with tension suddenly dissipated. He considers, then rejects, shaking her hand; the gesture seems too familiar. "I – have a good day?"

"I'll try," Conroy says dryly. She smiles down at her notes before looking back up at him, a grandmother's austere face above her plain white blouse and open black robe. "Now, I'm sure you have a partner who'd like to hear your news."

"Yes, Your Honor." He does, Charles thinks. Part of him wants to pelt madly down the hall and tackle Erik on the courthouse steps, shouting his victory to the entire city. Another part of him wants to walk calmly past the defense attorneys, who are probably hovering, waiting for the decision, and smile and nod, and let them make of that what they will.

Instead, he makes his way unobtrusively back to the room where the same officer relieves him of his AMD unit. He offers Charles a packet of lotion without much enthusiasm, gesturing to his forehead to indicate its application. The small abrasive sponge he'd rubbed over Charles's temple before attaching the electrode and contact pad have left the skin raw and irritated, a small patch of discomfort in the overwhelming relief that's just now starting to shake through him.

The relief becomes more real, step by step and minute by minute, as he exits the courthouse. Once he's outside, he stretches his mind free – pointedly away from any goings-on inside the building, and towards the brilliant strobe-light flash of Erik's mind, waiting for him at the bottom of the steps.

_Well?_ Erik sends, the most impatient Charles has ever heard him.

_It's okay_ , Charles tells him, incapable of keeping his smile back now. _We did it._

Erik's smile is faint – his public smile – but it's there, too, reflecting the happiness and relief spreading through his mind. _You did it,_ , he corrects.

Charles can feel how badly Erik wants to open his arms and pull Charles into a hug, hold him like that, maybe even spin him around. Erik pushes it back down, feelings to let out later, when they're alone and private once more, but he does clasp Charles's shoulder and give his back a firm pat as Charles comes near enough.

_Tell me about it?_ Erik says as they start walking towards the parking space.

Charles sends him the memory of the experience, only editing out a few of his feelings about the AMD and memories of his father's lab (Erik is upset enough about that as is, no need to get into it further right now). By the time they reach the car, Erik's processed through the images and is looking at Charles with that admiration that Charles can never get enough of. 

"You did good," Erik says, leaning over the hood of the car. "And even if you do decide – even if you've already decided you don't want to do this anymore, nobody's going to be able to downplay or doubt any of the good work you've done all this time."

"I do hope history will look upon me kindly," Charles says. His mouth hurts a little from how wide he's smiling as he lets himself back into his familiar spot in the passenger seat of Erik's car.

* * *

There's more work to do that afternoon, of course, but the rest of the day seems to go quickly without that cloud hanging over his head, especially after Moira's confirmation that the defense's motion has been officially rejected.

"It may not be over," Moira says, but she sounds far more satisfied than worried as she slips her cell phone into her pocket; Blaire had called her. "Still, we're solid for now, and even if we don't win the case," it's a real possibility, given their evidence and notwithstanding Russo's confession, "it won't be because the evidence you obtained is going to be excluded."

"Not bad," Emma says coolly as she pretends to idle by Erik's desk to congratulate them. The smile she offers Charles is, very nearly, warm, its sincerity blunted by the sarcasm touching the corners of her lipsticked mouth. "Our baby boy, defending the honor of telepaths everywhere."

"Go to hell, Frost," Erik growls. But he doesn't feel as testy as he usually gets when Emma's in his presence for longer than five seconds.

"I'll take your suggestion into consideration." Emma bestows another condescending smile on Erik and drifts off, to be replaced by Logan and his gruff approval, then Ororo, then Alex, a few others who've heard the news. Charles receives their congratulations in a daze, torn between wanting to project his happiness to the entire world and to keep it to himself. It's like, very nearly, how he feels about Erik sometimes: he wants everyone to know how happy he is, how lucky, how wonderful Erik is – but at the same time, he wants all of that joy kept safe inside him because it's too much, too overwhelming.

"You want to go out?" Logan asks as he stumps by on his way to Moira's, a folder of his own under his arm. "Might even buy you something' decent, celebration and all."

"And Howlett's mind goes right to the alcohol," Alex, who's eavesdropping nearby, says.

"Fuck, Summers, it's always there." Logan glowers down at Charles from underneath his improbable eyebrows. "Well, Xavier?"

"Not tonight," Charles says, trying not to look too obviously at Erik. "Rain check?"

Logan grunts and says, "I'll hold you to that," and Charles is in a good enough mood that he doesn't even flinch or strike back when Logan tousles his hair before he walks away.

He gets a text from Jean, too, saying _I can feel your great mood from all the way across town! Dare I guess make-up sex?_ She's not quite at the point where she can initiate a telepathic conversation with him from this far away (though Charles knows it's only a matter of time; in a couple of years she'll likely be almost as powerful as he is), but the combination of how well she knows Charles and how happy Charles is right now is enough to overflow into her receptive brain. 

_Not yet_ , Charles types quickly. _This is something else._ He searches out and locates her in one of the carrels of her school's library and switches to wordless mental conversation with her to explain the situation. He keeps it short, all broad strokes. _I'll get into more details next time,_ , he promises, cutting himself off as he notices the time. 

_About this and the discussion yesterday, I hope!_

_Definitely – although_ , Charles adds carefully, thinking of Erik's hypothetical reaction, _some things are private, of course. But, oh! We're going to have a party when I move in. You'll finally get to meet him in person then!_

He can feel the mental equivalent of Jean's peal of laughter. _I don't know whether to be excited or scared_.

_Both, probably_ , Charles says, and then they make their goodbyes with a soft beam of affection.

Erik is already standing by the desk, smoothing his jacket over his pants. "Ready to head home?"

"Very ready," Charles affirms, although he's careful to keep to himself the rush of happiness he feels at hearing _home_. He packs his satchel and signs out, endures a few more congratulations (and a spine-numbing slap on the back from Logan), before he and Erik can make their escape. He's eager enough to get out that he tugs on his coat and scarf while they're walking, barely getting his hat in place before the step out into the arctic air of the parking garage.

_I wish tomorrow wasn't a work day_ , he says to Erik, who's striding along, outwardly calm but bubbling over with pleasure and fierce satisfaction at what he sees as Charles's vindication. _We should celebrate._

_We'll celebrate tonight_ , Erik sends, a bit of heat to the words despite the fact that they're still, technically, at work. That heat melts him a little, enough for him to twine his bare fingers through Charles's gloved ones for a moment before shifting the car into gear.

"I never thought this would happen." Charles watches the familiar cityscape scroll by, the endless, neat rows of buildings with their Christmas decorations and busy post-work shoppers marching on in their rank and file. "I thought, _well, even if it's going to go against you, and it probably will, you should at least represent yourself well, and don't fuck it up_. But it... the judge _believed_ me, Erik."

"As she should have," Erik says. He gives Charles one of his lovely, warm glances, the kind he saves for the privacy of their home. "You're the best person I know, Charles. She had to have seen at least some of that."

It's always strange hearing optimism from Erik's lips; strange, but still nice. "I'm not sure judges are supposed to make decisions just based on whether or not someone seems like a good person," Charles says thoughtfully, "but I appreciate the sentiment."

Erik holds back his smile, still. "What do you want for dinner tonight? It's your turn to choose. We could order in..."

"Actually, I think I'd prefer not getting take-out tonight. Once we're home and alone, I don't want to have to pay attention to anybody else or let them interrupt. Just me and you."

"I can go for that," Erik says. His voice is already starting to get gravelly, the deep rumble that makes Charles's insides shiver in anticipation and delight. Erik is flipping through the contents of the kitchen in his brain, looking for something relatively quick. Charles stops him when he gets to the freezer.

"The ravioli sounds good," Charles says, and Erik nods in agreement.

They park near Erik's building. It's another happy surprise when Erik takes Charles's hand as they walk down the sidewalk. He only lets go after they've entered the lobby and headed to the mailroom, when he needs two hands to sort through the mail from his box. It's mostly catalogs and ads, thrown immediately into recycling. One of the building's other inhabitants pass by and smiles at Charles – he recognizes her, an old lady he's made polite conversation with on the elevator before, held the door open for when she's come home with groceries. Erik still may not have met a single one of his neighbors, even after all the years he's lived here, but Charles has started to become familiar with some of them. 

_In a few weeks, they'll be my neighbors, too_ , Charles thinks, and even now he can't believe how much he's smiling.

_Please tell me you're not going to invite the entire building to the party_ , Erik says. He's only partly joking, although once he's got a hand free again, and the few pieces of mail he wants tucked under his arm, his fingers twine through Charles's again.

_Oh, I was thinking something like an open house... Say, one to five in the afternoon, people can come and go as they please..._ The horror that shivers through him – and actually appears on Erik's face as he contemplates platoons of strangers tramping in and out of his sanctuary – makes Charles laugh, the teasing softened with a kiss that Erik grudgingly receives. _No, only our friends. Jean, Scott, Alex, Moira, Logan, Ororo, Henry... And then we'll get rid of them after a few hours, and it'll just be us._

_We could just not have them_ , Erik rumbles, although now he's just being cantankerous for the sake of it. Charles smirks and presses himself along Erik's side, feeling Erik's resistance give way as it almost always does, softening so they fit comfortably together.

The elevator ride up and the walk down the hall, Erik's door swinging open as Erik's powers unlock it, are all just like any other day. Today, though, they assume a new significance, as if the lens through which Charles has seen them has been polished anew, or adjusted, coloring every movement, every thought in Erik's head, with new and vivid hues. It's ridiculous and romantic, but Charles doesn't really see the harm in being either of those things, especially when, after he thinks to Erik, _this is my home too_ , it gets Erik pushing him up against the door, kissing him deeply, hungrily – as if, Charles thinks giddily, they're kissing for the first time too.

Except it's so much _better_ than their real first kiss was, without the anger and distrust and distance that lay between them then. Charles can't help but be amazed that they ever managed to get from _there_ to _here_. If he were the sort of person who believed in miracles, he's sure this would have to be one: that they found each other and have managed to stick, through all the shit that surrounds them both.

He wraps his hands around Erik's neck, hitching himself up as much as he can on the leg Erik's pressed between his. He still has on his gloves, his coat, his scarf; too many layers for him to feel properly, and too much heat in the warmth of Erik's apartment, but he doesn't want to let go of Erik, even to remedy that. It's Erik who has to pull away, his hands firm on Charles's waist even through his coat, holding Charles steady on the ground as he steps away.

Charles groans at the loss of the kiss, which makes Erik smile his wide, knowing smile, one of the ones nobody else gets to see. 

"I should go make dinner before we go any further," Erik says. "You've barely eaten today."

Charles tears off his winter gear, one piece at a time, letting it fall in a pile at his feet. Erik doesn't even seem to notice; he's too busy staring at Charles's face and body. Charles is already hard, just from the kissing, obvious through the nice trousers he wore today, and Erik's gaze lingers there a while before returning to meet Charles's eyes.

Charles is pretty sure Erik could get him off in just a few moments right now, and he'd be ready to go again by the time they're done eating. On the other hand, though, if he waits, he knows Erik will make that worth his while in the end, too. "Whatever you want," Charles says, looking up at Erik from under his eyelashes. 

"Dinner," Erik murmurs, "and then..." He trails off, traces a thumb across Charles's lower lip. It's an invitation for Charles to bite, which he accepts, Erik allowing him to worry at the firm flesh and suck away the sting of sharp canines. Erik tugs his thumb free and kisses Charles one last time, lingering and firm, before stepping away.

_Hmph_ , Charles says. That gets him a _Terrible boy_ and an _incorrigible_ for good measure, and Erik's wonderful, wicked smile when Erik finally turns to head through to the kitchen. Lust and anticipation trail in the air behind him like rich perfume, and Charles wants to follow it, follow it right into Erik's arms and any one of a dozen delicious things they could get up to. He makes himself head in the opposite direction, down the short hallway to Erik's – _their_ – bedroom and to the new possibilities the space presents.

He changes quickly, ruffling up his hair and shaking free the rest of the tension that's lived just underneath the relief and joy he's been swimming in since the meeting with the judge. As he's heading out of the bedroom, having dropped his clothes in _their_ hamper and thought about where some of his books might fit on _their_ built-in bookshelf (god, he's being ridiculous), he catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

The boy looking back at him isn't the boy he's seen every day since he got back from Oxford. Charles examines his face minutely, searching for the wariness, the attitude, the masks he's constructed in the years since he'd left home.

He can't find them.

He thinks about the conversation with Erik yesterday. Not perfect, Erik had said, but okay. It's true, Charles realizes now, not just about their relationship, but about his life in general. 

He's not sure he ever really thought he would _get_ to okay. He's so far from the boy he was before he started working with the Erik, the boy who dropped out of Oxford, the child in his father's labs. A year ago he wouldn't have been able to imagine his life being anything like this.

It seems like it should be scary. Charles has spent an awful lot of time being afraid; that's why he hid, or ran, or backed away. But he doesn't feel afraid now, looking at his reflection in the mirror. He feels ... hopeful. Happy, even. He has those feelings without the immediate follow-up of all the ways they're going to get fucked up.

"Not perfect," Charles says out loud, rolling the words around in his mouth. "But okay. Right now, it's okay."

Erik's voice in his head interrupts his reverie with fond impatience. _How long does it take you to get changed, anyway?_

_Can you really not last five minutes without me, Lehnsherr? That's sweet_ , Charles retorts, turning away from the mirror as he heads back to meet Erik in the kitchen.

Erik already has the water on to boil and the ravioli beginning to thaw, something that looks suspiciously like a cream sauce coagulating in a saucepan, smelling of garlic and sherry. Better than the promise of food, though, welcome as it is, is Erik, who's beginning to unwind from his own day. His tie is off, draped with his jacket over the back of the couch – to be stowed, Charles is sure, on their designated hangers once Erik heads back – and he's undone the top few buttons of his dress shirt. It's more than enough to give Charles a view of the delicious hollow of Erik's neck, the divot between his collar bones, and more than enough for Charles to know that Erik's done it deliberately.

It means, of course, Charles has to kiss him, rumpling up Erik a little more, sending him hot thoughts about how much he likes Erik's end-of-day stubble and his scent (fading aftershave, sweat, even the cigarette he and Moira had shared while Charles had been speaking with the judge), and a proposition that includes delaying dinner. Erik laughs softly against Charles's mouth, thinking things like _impossible_ and _maybe I wanted to do that_ about the newly-disarranged state of Charles's hair before he pulls himself together.

"Do you think you could manage not to burn the kitchen down while I change?" Erik asks after Charles lets him go.

"I guess," Charles says dubiously. "How long will you be?"

"Not as long as you," Erik says. He smirks and slides around Charles while Charles grumbles indignantly.

It's a dance, Charles decides, that's already starting to become familiar. He pours the wine and keeps an eye on the sauce, daring to stir it a few times before he sets their places at the breakfast bar. By the time Erik reappears, in soft old jeans and t-shirt, Charles is ready to take up his station on the counter and to watch as Erik checks the sauce and dumps in the ravioli. Erik pauses in his preparations long enough to kiss Charles again, and to touch him with quick, affectionate glances of fingers across his wrist or cheek. It's not that Erik can't believe Charles is here, is here for _good_ , but the touches are affirmations all the same.

Dinner is relatively quiet, a comfortable silence. Erik's mind is warm and soft, like a blanket that Charles wants to stroke against his cheek. Charles doesn't think of himself as possessive in the same way Erik so obviously is, but maybe there's more of it in him than he knows, because there is such a delight in knowing that he sees this gentleness in Erik that the rest of the world is so blind to. He loves Erik when he's passionate and angry and spitting out sparks; he loves Erik when he's silent and seemingly cold and cut off from the rest of the world; but he loves Erik like this, too, the fire steady but controlled, in the background, letting this other piece of him shine through.

Charles is – as often happens – hungrier than he thought himself to be. He's lost count of how many times he's sat to down to dinner out of a dutiful knowledge that it's what needs to happen, only to have the first bite find him ravenous. He's come to suspect that it's too easy for him to get lost in his mind, and forget to pay enough attention to his body. Another thing that's better with Erik around, maybe. He's always completely aware of _Erik's_ body, after all – and from there, his body _with_ Erik's. Something to stop him from floating away. 

An anchor. Erik's his anchor.

He takes a second helping of the ravioli, even though Erik's already finished eating and is pouring himself another glass of wine. Charles nudges his foot against Erik's, pleased when it makes Erik laugh his huff of a laugh.

"That was delicious," Charles says, setting down his fork with a sigh. He's barely touched his own wine, but he sips some now, before he gets up to collect the dishes.

Erik stays seated, drinking and watching Charles with half-lidded eyes as he moves about the kitchen. Charles doesn't hurry about his tasks in cleaning up, making sure to do each one carefully and deliberately before moving on to the next.

"I've never seen you take such care in the dishes before," Erik says dryly.

"I just wanted to show you how well I've internalized your instructions on the proper care of dishes," Charles tells him. He tosses Erik a smirk over his shoulder. "Are you saying you _don't_ want me to be careful? I could accidentally leave an atom of sauce on one..."

Erik snorts. "You aren't as funny as you think you are, you know."

"Really?" Charles finishes sponging down the counter, quickly rinses down the sink and washes his hands. He's drying them when he turns around, taking the two short steps across the kitchen to the counter and the raised breakfast bar. Erik watches him bemusedly, but the bemusement turns to heat when Charles leans up and over the counter top, and then to purpose when Erik leans in to kiss him.

_Actually_ , Charles says, feeling Erik's heat flow through him, a slow burn he thinks he'd like to relish, to bask in for a while, _I thought I'd let you appreciate how nice my ass looks in these jeans. If I'd known you were going to critique my dish-sanitizing skills, I wouldn't have bothered._

"I noticed," Erik says, his voice gone rough. He pauses for another kiss, lingering, tongue licking deep and fierce into Charles's mouth. _I always notice_.

_I know_. In the same way his mind and body orient to Erik's, Erik's body turns to him. And, Charles realizes with a thrill that awes him, Erik's mind as well. After a year it's disconcerting if he doesn't have Erik's mind nearby. It's as disconcerting for Erik not to have Charles there on the outskirts of his thoughts. After years of having his gift treated as an experiment or an aberration, and even after his victory today, Charles can't imagine anything better than having someone welcoming his telepathy the same way he welcomes Charles's touch.

_Do we light the candles now?_ Charles asks. There's something appealing in the thought of making out on the couch while the candles burn and his tiny ridiculous tree – which Erik has strung with lights – glowing blue and gold and red in its corner.

Erik pulls away from the kiss, letting Charles go so he can make his way around the counter and out of the kitchen. When Charles is close, Erik lays his hand upon the small of his back, palm spread out wide, and leads Charles to the window. 

Charles lights the first candle, then picks it up and hands it to Erik. Four candles for the fourth night, Erik lighting them one by one before replacing the first.

Charles curls up against the firm wall of Erik's body, looking at the lights. 

Erik nuzzles the top of his head and says, "If you want to go sit on the couch, I'll be with you in just a minute, okay?"

"Okay," Charles agrees, though he wonders what else Erik has to do. He gets his answer not too long after he's settled himself onto the comfy cushions, when the the sound of music begins to fill the room. Charles doesn't know who it is, but it's different from what he's used to hearing Erik play, which is mostly loud classic rock of various stripes. This is something quieter, jazzier, more in sync with the mood of tonight.

Erik joins him, using his power to shut off the overhead lights. "This is what you were thinking of?" he asks. Charles can just make out his smile in the dim light that's left from the tree and candles.

"More like this," Charles says, yanking hard on the collar of Erik's shirt until Erik leans over, covering Charles's body with his.

"Impatient," Erik murmurs. It's appreciation, not a criticism, followed up by Erik kissing him firmly and settling himself atop Charles. For answer, Charles grins up at him, unabashed and unashamed, _I know and that's just one of the many reasons you love me_.

There's some shifting to get themselves settled, so Charles is on his back with Erik cradled between his thighs, Erik's lovely, strong torso ranged up and down Charles's body, his heat caging Charles and weighing him down. It's one of those things that, in other days, with other people, would have sent Charles's instincts howling for escape. But with Erik, he loves it, loves the sense of safety without weakness, of being controlled without being erased or turned into a toy. When Erik's long fingers wrap around his wrists, forcing them into the cushions, Charles shivers, contentment and anticipation stirring in him.

"So," Erik murmurs as he licks and nips at Charles's neck, just this side of too-sharp, "what do you want to do tonight?"

_Making out on the couch is always fun_ , Charles says. It's still early, although the sky is winter-dark beyond the windows. _I love it when you do this_ , he says, not entirely trusting his voice with Erik rocking so deliciously against him. _Love you holding me down, making me take what you want to give me..._

Erik makes a low noise, scraping his teeth gently but firmly against Charles's skin. His thoughts aren't quite formed into words, maybe not even quite consciously acknowledged, but Charles can translate what he's thinking anyway – that what Erik loves is that Charles _lets_ Erik give him what he wants, that he trusts Erik enough to put himself into his hands like this, knowing Erik won't let him down or go too far.

Erik releases his wrists, and Charles takes the opportunity to raise his arms above his head, reaching to clutch at the sofa arm beyond. Erik's hands are already busy elsewhere, one of them slipping just under the hem of Charles's t-shirt to palm his waist, thumb stroking soft circles on his belly. His other arm he's using to take some of his weight, as he pushes his hips against Charles's a bit more deliberately, pushing Charles further down into the soft cushions with each motion.

Erik kisses his way up Charles's throat, his jaw, behind his ear. He takes the lobe of Charles's ear into his mouth, tugging on it with his teeth until Charles cries out, and then soothing the instant of giddy pain with his lips. 

Charles's eyes are closed, and he knows his mouth is half-open, waiting for Erik's kiss, but every time he tries to turn, strain up to find Erik's mouth, Erik gently pushes him back into place. 

_What I want to give you, you said_ , Erik reminds him. _I can have enough patience for both of us if I need to._

_Love you, hate you, tease_ , Charles thinks in an incoherent rush that he knows will have no effect on Erik at all. He arches up beneath Erik, using his grip of the edge of the sofa for a bit of leverage, and sighs at the friction when Erik grinds back down on him.

Erik raises himself up a little, keeping Charles down with a wide palm across his chest when he tries to follow. He rucks Charles's t-shirt up to his armpits, and Charles shivers a little. Not from cold – Erik is still close enough that he can feel the heat of his body – but his nipples are exposed now, hardening in the slightly cooler air and Erik's gaze.

"You have very pretty nipples," Erik says, so seriously that a laugh jolts out of Charles. Only it isn't really funny, exactly, more like laughter – shading quickly into silence – is the only way to respond to Erik's honest, unflinching appraisal of him. Erik looks up briefly, a smirk curling his lips, as he runs the pad of his index finger over one nipple, pulling another shiver from Charles, and a whine this time. "So fun to play with," Erik purrs as he lowers his head, licking across the other nipple before taking it in his mouth. _So sensitive._

"Fuck, Erik." Charles reflexively lets go of the couch, hands flying to Erik's head to keep him right where he is, his warm mouth and lips and tongue teasing one nipple and then the other, hint of teeth when Charles is about to go boneless and limp from the drowsy pleasure that's stealing through him. That bite gets Erik a tug on his hair, but Erik only smirks against Charles's skin and resumes torturing him.

_So good, so good like this_ , Erik's thinking, or maybe Charles is. They're blurring at their edges, the few scraps of coherent thought smudging together. When Charles can separate out himself from Erik, he catches Erik's hazily elated thoughts, how it feels having Charles under him, how he tastes, how he loves having Charles stroke and pet him as Erik plays with him. Charles sighs, drunk on Erik's happiness and his own, _wanna make it better?_ a faint thread of suggestion as he shifts up into Erik again.

_What's better than this?_ Erik thinks, but even as he says it he's giving Charles's nipples one last lick and kissing a trail down Charles's chest. He stops just below Charles's navel, concentrating all his attention to that patch of skin before his clothing begins again.

"Erik..." Charles says softly.

Erik shushes him as he tugs gently on the waistband of Charles's jeans, pulling them down an inch or so – not letting Charles's cock out, not yet, but exposing more of his lower belly and his hips. Erik nuzzles at the crease where his thigh meets his hip bone, and then he's sucking on it, more of that stinging almost-pain-turned-pleasure that makes Charles melt. 

Charles can't help but wish Erik's hair was a bit longer; he can't quite get the grip on it that he wants, to bury his fingers deep and pull. And, just as good, direct Erik to where he wants more sensation, any part of him that feels neglected.

Erik raises himself up, knees on either side of Charles's legs, and looks down at Charles's body. "You're so pale," he tells Charles. "Apart from those freckles, at least. It makes me want to mark you all over." 

"You can," Charles says. "I mean, I'm okay with that. _More_ than okay."

Erik smiles again, and runs his fingertips along Charles's waist, and lower, planning where to put them. "All these hickeys and bite marks where nobody can see them but me and you, hm?"

Charles nods. _Yes, just me and you..._. He pushes himself up against the too-light pressure of Erik's fingers, another hint, one that Erik finally decides to attend to, as he chuckles and pulls Charles's boxers down a little lower, letting his hard-on bob free into the air.

When Erik goes right back to sucking and biting Charles's hip, raising bruises like nebulas, Charles groans and twists, trying to get some kind of friction on his cock. At least with his pants on he'd had the weight of his zipper and the fabric, but now Erik's so _close_ but not touching and Charles wants his hand, his mouth, _anything_ on his cock before he dies of frustration. All his twisting and writhing gets him, though, is sharp teeth sinking into his hip and more of Erik's wonderful, tormenting mouth.

_Did I mention I hate you?_ Charles sends as clearly as he can. Erik only grins against the curve of Charles's hip and thigh – and lifts up, hovering above Charles's cock, before setting his mouth on Charles's other hip and beginning to mark him there. Erik's _right there_ , so close and yet so far, and even reminding himself Erik's marking him, that he'll have a band of bites and bruises across his hips just like he wants only makes him more desperate.

Just when he's about to despair of Erik ever putting his mouth on his cock, Erik licks a long stripe up his length. Charles nearly comes off the couch, held down only by the weight of Erik's broad shoulders, _Erik!_ wrenched from his mind like a shout made up of the name and Charles's frustrated desire and his lust. Erik responds with a pleased hum and begins to suck delicately on Charles's cockhead, projecting truly obscene amounts of satisfaction as he does so. _And you call me a monster_, Charles thinks as he collapses back into the cushions, giving himself up to Erik's mouth and tongue, and the hands that are busy again on his nipples, pinching and twisting and slowly driving Charles out of his mind.

_Keep you like this_ , Erik thinks hazily, the words jumbled with images of having Charles balanced on the edge for ages, flushed and beautiful and utterly, completely Erik's to ruin. _And just when you think you can't take it anymore, I'll let you come and fuck you slow until you're hard again._

It tears a moan out of Charles, from deep in his chest, one that shifts into a soft cry as Erik's mouth and hands leave him again. _No, come back–_ he thinks, starting to raise himself up on his elbows to see what Erik is doing, but his body feels heavier, denser, than it usually does, and even something so small is an effort, like slogging through something thick and murky.

"Just getting these out of the way," Erik mutters, a soothing pat on Charles's stomach before he pulls Charles's pants all the way off, throwing them down on the floor beside the couch. He grabs Charles's hands, drags them over to his nipples so Charles can feel his heart throbbing under his fingers. 

"You take care of yourself here until I tell you to stop, all right?" 

He doesn't wait for an answer before he's lying back down, hitching one of Charles's legs up and over his shoulder as he takes Charles's cock back into his mouth. Still too little, still playing, but his hands are beneath Charles now, cupping his ass, squeezing and groping appreciatively, occasionally letting one of his fingers glance across Charles's crack and making him jump, thrusting up as far as Erik's weight will let him.

_You have the world's most beautiful ass, I swear to God_ , Erik says, with the same kind of pleasure in his mental voice as a scientist who's just proved a long-standing hypothesis. Charles feels, vaguely, that Erik is entirely too calm at the moment – so even and composed even when he's sucking Charles's cock, doing such terrible and wonderful things – but Charles is too lost himself to devote much concentration to how to fix that.

_Touch yourself_ , Erik orders softly, his head filled with images of Charles teasing himself, his nipples puffy and sore, perfect for Erik to lick over and soothe at his leisure. Pulled along by the force of that thought, Charles pinches his nipples, harder than Erik would do it. He's not sure if he's trying to ease the ache in himself or just build it higher and higher. He keeps chewing on his lower lip, working the flesh ragged; every time he notices himself doing it, he forces himself to stop, but it doesn't keep it from happening again.

_Like it when you do that_ , Erik murmurs, and of course he's looking up at Charles with his evil, hot eyes as he sucks demurely at the tip of his cock, tongue lapping up the precome there. _Your poor, swollen lip... Have to kiss it better later, won't I?_

"Uff," Charles says. He catches himself starting to worry at that sore bit of flesh again.

_You're beautiful like this_ , Erik tells him. And that – god, the way he says it, it isn't with the teasing coolness of before, it's honest admiration, Erik absolutely overcome by him, by _him_ , Charles. _You're always beautiful_ , Erik adds, a thought that maybe he didn't mean to let escape but he's too proud to take back, and it's not only a thought for Charles's ass or cock or nipples or face, but a series of qualities Erik can't articulate, everything that in Erik's head adds up to Charles being who and what he is. The impossible, brilliant boy he got saddled with, the same one he grew to respect and – before he knew it or could admit it to himself – love. 

"Come here," Charles whispers, because he can't, he _can't_ take this anymore. Whatever's in his voice must communicate itself to Erik because he's crawling up Charles's body, wild-eyed and desperate, nearly falling into a kiss that's as fierce and uncontrolled as everything Erik's done so far has been deliberate. It's mostly teeth and tongue and incoherence, Erik breathing harshly into Charles's mouth as he gets a hand between them and starts to jerk Charles off. A picture of Charles floats through Erik's head, his shirt pushed up and his bruise-decorated skin and aching nipples so vulnerable, exposed to the world if not for Erik's body covering him and keeping him safe. And of course he's mostly naked, save for the shirt that isn't covering much of anything, and it makes Erik feel powerful and protective – and helpless at the same time, caught up by love and attraction he can't fight against and doesn't want to.

Charles is pretty sure it will never stop being this astonishing, knowing how _much_ Erik feels for him. Knowing that everything Charles feels is returned so strongly. He wonders how anybody can possibly look at Erik and think him cold or unfeeling or rigid – how can anybody see Erik and not _know_ this about him, how deep and strong and fiercely he loves? 

But then, it had taken Charles by surprise in the beginning, too – even at the first, when he'd been bewildered by that random detective not citing him for buying underage. After the open wound that was his family, and then his years by himself, nothing could have shocked Charles more than this did, feeling himself bloom under Erik's hands, like the discovery of verdant land where he'd thought himself nothing but desert. 

He's shaking apart, feeling like he's going to fall to pieces, and the only things he knows are Erik's lips against his and Erik's fingers working his cock, and Erik's body above him holding him together. He doesn't _need_ Erik to protect him, but it feels so right to sit back and let him, give himself over in such an intimate way. He trusts Erik so much, he _loves_ Erik so much, and he knows Erik will never take those things Charles can't give, the things that make Charles himself, and so he can lay himself open for Erik, every nook and cranny, and know that Erik will love him nonetheless...

_Yes_ , Erik says, and Charles's isn't completely sure if it's aloud or in his head. _Yes, baby, I know, I know..._

Charles digs his nails into Erik's strong, still-clothed shoulders, and thinks, _Erik, please, make me come._

Erik grunts into their kiss, his grip tightening on Charles's cock in a way that's delicious but not quite enough to push Charles over the edge. Charles tries to hold in the sob as Erik slows down his stroke, using his thumb to tease at the head. _Are you sure? You can't keep going a little longer?_

Charles nods frantically. He's spilling over with desperation, overloading on how much he needs Erik and how much Erik needs him; he feels like a nuclear reactor gone critical, no way to contain himself or keep himself back. He rocks up into Erik's fingers as best he can, although with Erik laid out atop him he can't get all of what he needs. _You can still fuck me_ , he promises, _fuck me like you wanted, you know I love you however I can get you, just please, let me come before I die._

"Shhh," Erik murmurs against his mouth. Charles wants to cry because Erik can't possibly think he can drag this out, but then Erik begins to stroke him, firm and perfect, his long torso arching above Charles's now so he has room to work. "Come on, baby," Erik says roughly, "let me see you come, want to see you spilling all over my hand, want to feel you..."

_Oh, fuck, Erik_ is the last clear thought Charles can produce. Erik strokes him hard and vicious a few more times, just the way Charles likes it, and the thought that Erik wants to feel him, wants the feeling of Charles in his head and the stickiness of his come all over his hand – that Erik's looking down at him, flushed and frantic, his body decorated with the marks Erik's put there – finishes him. His orgasm burns through him like fire roaring up from a spark, white-hot and erasing everything except itself. Erik's love and admiration throbs like a steady counterpoint, hazy thoughts of _god so beautiful so hot I love you_ for Charles to cling to as he comes and goes blank and drifts.

He returns to Erik petting him, long deliberate strokes down his torso as he heaves for breath. His belly is a sticky, shivering mess, come splattered across it – and, Charles realizes with a pleased shiver, a few stripes on his chest as well. Erik is curled around him, holding him close, his mind lit up and warm with affection and satisfaction. And, Charles observes with a wry (if shaky) smile, elation at being the only person who can see Charles like this, so ruined and wrecked and loving it enough to stretch and preen a little once he can move again.

"Monster," Erik mutters, pressing a kiss to the slowing gallop of the pulse in Charles's wrist.

_You wouldn't have me any other way_ , Charles says, confident in the truth of what he's saying.

"Mmm," Erik says, which might be an agreement or might just be the noise he needs to make as he nuzzles against Charles's hand.

Charles strokes Erik's cheek, the strong line of his jaw. "I can't believe you still have all your clothes on."

Erik breathes out a faint laugh. He unfolds his body slowly from Charles, from the couch, rising to stand beside him. Even in the dim room, backlit only by the string of lights on the tree, Charles is struck again by how handsome he is, the unreal lines of his torso. Erik's jeans are unbuttoned and unzipped – presumably done by his powers sometime when his hands were busy with Charles. Charles reaches out to lay his palm against the huge bulge of Erik's erection through his shorts, pressing the heel of his hand against the damp circle where he's been leaking all this time. 

Erik sighs, shifting on his feet, pushing into Charles's hand for a moment before taking another step back. He tugs his jeans off entirely, draping them over one arm. "If you want me to fuck you, you'll have to come to bed," he tells Charles, half-serious but also half-smug at how thoroughly he's debauched Charles.

Charles frowns – or, at least, he thinks he does; Erik would probably call it a pout – torn between wanting that and how little he wants to move. "Can't you fuck me here?"

"What, dry?" Erik says, raising an eyebrow.

Charles stretches again, arms above his head, showing off one more what Erik's done to him. "I'd let you," he says, more for the reaction he knows it'll tear from Erik than for any serious suggestion. It works, too, and he can hear Erik's sharp intake of breath, knows that Erik is swallowing against the tightness in his throat that comes with the spike of arousal.

"I could do that," Erik says, his voice deceptively mild. "Or maybe I could just jerk off here onto that gorgeous face of yours."

That sounds good, too. Charles imagines it, being covered with Erik's come, surrounded by his smell, his taste. It'd be lovely, but he pushes the thought away after a moment, because, well. Nothing's as good as having Erik inside him, taking that perfect cock deep into his ass or throat.

"Help me up," he orders, holding up his hands. Erik huffs and says, "As the Master wishes," but grabs Charles's wrists and pulls him up and off the couch. He does it a bit harder than necessary, and Charles goes maybe a bit more pliant than is called for, because he ends up nearly collapsing face-first into Erik's chest, saved from it by Erik's arms coming around him to support him.

_Hey_. Charles tilts his head so he can grin up at Erik, who smiles bemusedly back down at him. _What's a nice boy like you doing in a place like this?_

"I live here," Erik says dryly. "It's a good thing you've got me, Xavier; your pickup lines are shit."

"Is that a service weapon in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?" He runs a meaningful hand over Erik's erection, barely hidden by his boxers. "Also, you have a _very_ interesting OAC2 mutation."

"This is supposed to be seductive?" Erik asks dubiously, although he does groan, hips hitching up into Charles's touch. "Because I'm not sure if it's working."

"It should!" Charles says indignantly, levering himself up to kiss Erik on the mouth, relishing the way Erik opens for him, delight and amusement and wickedness all at once. _I'm talking about police procedure and mutation in the same sentence. You should be dying to fuck me._

"Already am," Erik mutters as he grinds his erection into the groove of Charles's thigh, hitching up more firmly against Erik's body. He's so hard, dampness seeping through his shorts, all of him trembling with impatience and lust and Charles has to touch him all over, all his lean muscle and warm skin and thundering pulse. "The longer you keep me here, the harder I'm going to fuck you."

"Really?" He smirks, and Erik traces the arch of the eyebrow Charles is quirking at him. "Is that supposed to be a threat?"

"A promise," Erik informs him just before he strikes, moving fast enough Charles can't muster any kind of defense despite seeing the thought form in Erik's head. He ends up over Erik's shoulder, somewhere between a fireman's carry and being ignominiously carted off, struggling uselessly against the powerful arm Erik has wrapped around him and unable to do much more than pinch and scrape at Erik's back and make outraged noises.

"Put me down this _instant_ , Lehnsherr!" Charles orders as Erik begins to walk back to their bedroom, humming to himself. _Humming_. Charles growls.

"If that's not supposed to be adorable, you're doing something wrong," Erik says. With his free hand, he pats Charles on the ass.

"Goddammit, Erik," Charles says, thumping a fist on Erik's back as he twists in his grip, but they've reached the bedroom, and it's only a few long strides before Erik's at the bed, unceremoniously dropping Charles onto the mattress.

Charles pushes himself up on his elbows, blinking as his balance returns. The lamp comes on as Erik makes a vague gesture with his fingers, and then Erik's stripping the rest of his clothing, quick and neat. Charles doesn't have very long to appreciate the sight, because as soon as Erik's nude, he's back on the bed, crawling over Charles and leaning down to kiss him again, slow and deep, until Charles moans into it, scrunching the bedcovers in his fists.

Erik pulls away from the kiss, his teeth tugging a little on Charles's worried lower lip before letting go. The nightstand is just out of reach, even with Erik's long arms, and he has to raise himself and move over to reach the drawer and the lube. Charles strokes his hand up and down Erik's side, stretched out before him, letting his fingers dance lightly along Erik's ribs. 

"Does that tickle?" Charles says, even though he knows already that it does.

Erik glances back over to him, squinting a little. He shuts the drawer with a thump that makes the nightstand rattle against the wall, and tosses the lube onto the bed, near Charles's head, before moving back, kneeling back on his haunches over Charles's body.

Charles grins up at him. "Well?"

"Trying decide what exactly what I want to do to you," Erik mutters. He runs his hands across Charles's chest, tacky with sweat and come, making Charles shiver when he brushes over his over-sensitive nipples again. Erik's hands are so big; Charles can never get over it, seeing Erik's palm and fingers wide, covering so much of his skin. Erik brings his finger up to tug at the collar of Charles's t-shirt, and says, "Let's get this off already."

"Finally..." Charles sits up as best he can, partly to skin his shirt off and partly – once he's tossed it in some random corner – to kiss Erik. A thrill kicks through him, thinking how he's sitting here, caught between Erik's thighs, with Erik trembling above him, pulling Charles close against him so Charles can't escape even if he wants to. Erik moans deliciously against his mouth, rubbing at Charles's shoulders and back, his hands everywhere they can reach until Charles leans back and tugs Erik down into the sheets with him.

Erik's mind is a giddy whirl of happiness and disbelief, disbelief that he's _this_ happy, that this is real, until that unreality melts away and all that's left is his conviction that he'll make this as good for Charles as he can. _You realize that goes both ways_ , Charles tells him, shifting purposefully up against Erik, brushing against his hard cock. _It's not like I'm going to lie back and think of England if I don't think you're up to par_.

"I know," Erik says against Charles's mouth. They're still kissing, the on-again, off-again kissing that's sometimes just breath, sometimes deep and drowning. "Just, Charles, let me..."

_Yeah, okay_. Charles shifts underneath him and Erik lets him get up, an awkward poetry that ends with Charles on his belly, ass arching up into Erik's now-slick hand. Erik nuzzles and bites and sucks at Charles's neck and shoulders, moving to cover him again, his thoughts a tumble of how much he loves Charles's pale skin, the maps of his freckles and how strong his back is, his sturdy hips, his ass, _everything_. A slick finger pushes into him and Charles gasps, tensing a moment before he lets himself go limp, and Erik's soothing him with soft nonsense words, telling Charles things Erik would never let himself say anywhere else, even if he thinks them loudly enough.

"You always open up so good for me," Erik rasps as he fucks Charles carefully, adding a second finger now. "I just love the way you take me, like you can't get enough of me."

''S 'cause I can't," Charles tells him. He pushes as best he can against Erik's weight, trying to get more of those fingers in him. "Hurry up."

"I'm the one who's been waiting patiently," Erik says sweetly, although he administers a reproving nip to Charles's shoulder. "You've gotten off already."

"You'd think that'd make you _want_ to pick up the pace," Charles grumbles. "I think you _like_ waiting, just to be contrary – _Oh_." He lapses into silence as Erik gives him a third finger, losing focus on anything but the sweet burn as his body adjusts.

Erik is speaking again behind him, something about savoring the experience, but Charles isn't listening; it's too hard to concentrate with the pads of Erik's fingers rubbing firmly against his prostate. He's dizzy with the pleasure of it, met head-on like this. 

He chokes out, "God, Erik–"

"That's it," Erik murmurs, free hand stroking all-too-calmly the length of Charles's back. "So good, baby, doing so good."

_What are you waiting for_? Charles thinks, stretching awkwardly to look over his shoulder, catch Erik's eyes – which, reassuringly, look much less controlled than Erik's touch would indicate. _Don't you want to be inside me?_

"God, yes," Erik breathes, and then it's happening, quickly now that Erik's made up his mind – pulling his fingers out (Charles groans at the loss, even knowing they're about to be replaced), grabbing the lube to slick his cock, and the slow push inside.

Charles thinks maybe this is one of his favorite parts – if that has any meaning, when they're all his favorite parts. But listening in to Erik's thoughts during this first penetration makes him dizzy, heightening the considerable physical pleasure he's already feeling to something even better. Erik's thinking about how good it feels ( _so hot, so tight_ ), but also watching, getting off on the sight of his big cock pushing slowly into Charles's hole, the sight of Charles stretching to take him in so completely.

Charles has never been a particularly visual person – his reliance on his telepathy means his other senses are somewhat under-developed, he suspects – but Erik _is_. It's obvious at work, all the details he notices, and it's certainly obvious in bed, how Erik sees (and hears and feels and tastes) _everything_ about him, every movement, sound, texture – everything, the same way Charles knows the particular rhythms and textures of Erik's mind. It makes Charles want to cater to it that much more.

He drops his head down, feels Erik's hands go tight on his hips, the rush of _fucking hot, god_ as Erik, and Charles through Erik's eyes, sees the long, vulnerable track of his spine and the bare curve of his nape, his shoulder blades rising up as he braces himself against the mattress. Charles sighs as Erik pushes deeper, watching Erik watch his fingers spreading Charles and holding him open, and pushes up a little, as much as he can given his position. It means Erik sinks in a little more, the stretch just that much sweeter, the burn that much deeper, but Erik's lust spikes geometrically, shattering his thoughts to pieces.

_God fuck Charles_ is the most Erik can manage, his mind unsteady on its foundations, as if Charles has managed to knock him off his balance. He's buried deep in Charles now, stretching him and filling him, and Erik's own mind is filled with the picture of Charles on elbows and knees, moving to fuck himself on Erik's cock. When Erik gets a hand under him, he feels Charles's cock, still damp from coming earlier, _Can you get hard for me again?_ that is half private disbelief and half question, a question Charles answers, nodding and swallowing heavily. _Yeah, yeah I will, you feel too good, want to come with you in me_.

When Erik starts to move, Charles encourages him along with soft, pleased noises, with a rock backward to show Erik how perfectly Charles can take him. Erik murmurs approvingly, his hands sliding from Charles's hips to his flanks, to his ribs – then, _mmmmm yes_ Charles thinks, down Charles's arms as Erik covers his body completely, his belly flat all along Charles's back. Like this Charles can feel him _everywhere_ , in him and on him and around him, swamping the air that he breathes and bleeding his heat into Charles everywhere they touch.

"Going to fuck you just like this," Erik mutters, his face tucked close against Charles's hair, his breath stirring the sweat-damp strands of it. He's got his hand wrapped loosely around Charles's cock, enough to be frustrating. Charles whines and Erik laughs. "You're so good like this, baby, taking me and wanting more."

"Yes," Charles manages to articulate between unsteady breaths, "yes, more."

HIs face is even hotter than the rest of his body; if he could see himself, he knows it would look like he's blushing, as ridiculous as that is, but it's an reflexive response to Erik's words. Charles has spent so much of his life convincing himself he doesn't care about what anybody thinks about him, but he craves Erik's praise with a fierce and naked longing. He _wants_ to be good for Erik, be his perfect boy like this, hear those words spill from Erik's mouth with that amazed love and approval.

"So good," Erik repeats. His thrusts are speeding up, but he's still in total control of himself and what he's doing to Charles. As much as Charles likes to joke about one of the advantages of dating an old man being his stamina, it's not actually untrue. It just makes it all the better when they reach that moment where something changes, when Charles manages to break through, pull Erik under just as far as Charles already is. 

Erik places his teeth on the nape of Charles's neck, not biting down, just holding him in place. It drags another whine from Charles as he bucks into Erik's hand. Erik tightens his grip on Charles's cock. It's a curious sensation, an almost painful delight, hardening and moving to the edge again so quickly. Truthfully, though, his cock seems almost secondary at this point; Erik is hitting his prostate perfectly, over and over, no pause to allow Charles to think or catch his breath, just an overwhelming onslaught of pleasure deep inside his body. He can feel his toes curling. 

_I love you_ , Charles thinks, gasping wetly against the pillow. _I love your cock. So much._

Erik _does_ bite down at that, a noise akin to a growl escaping him. 

The pain is what does it, coupled with Erik fucking into him mercilessly and dragging all that delight out of him. Charles unties the last of his control and reaches out to show Erik _this is what you're doing to me_.

Like this, he can't keep back what could be getting through to Erik, not just the aching perfection of Erik fucking him or how it feels to be held down and made to take each heavy thrust. Erik gets _everything_ , how Charles is completely overwhelmed, the totality of sensation and the emotions they cause in him – love, excitement, fear and not caring that he's afraid. He can't edit himself, not like this, not when he wants to show Erik he's affecting Charles the same way Charles is affecting him. 

_Charles_ , Erik thinks, brokenly loving and so utterly desperate. They're sweat-covered now, sliding along each other, Erik gathering Charles as close as he can get him. His thrusts are turning more inarticulate, stuttering as Erik's control shreds apart like fog in the sun, all finesse gone as he chases after his own orgasm. He's not touching Charles's cock anymore, which is fine; feeding off their mutual pleasure is more than enough, Charles is hard again. _I can finish myself_ , he says, _come all over for you, again, just come for me, darling, come in me, fill me up –_

Erik gets his arms around Charles, holds him up and close as his hips jerk and pound against Charles's ass. There aren't words for it, for the way Erik's mind is a cacophony of love and Charles's name and every shred of how this moment feels, what it does to him. He's never been like this with anyone else, hasn't ever been able to give himself up to them the way he can with Charles. There aren't words for that either. And there aren't words for the way Erik's mind goes blank as he comes, his lithe, wonderful body tensing against Charles's, his arms locking to keep him close, as Erik begins to spend himself deep into Charles's body.

_So good, darling_ , Charles croons, mental voice like fingers threading gently through Erik's hair. _So good to me._

Erik murmurs something unintelligible against Charles's shoulder. Charles can feel it, the way Erik's stretched his body almost to the limit; now that's he reached his climax, the urge to just give in and collapse is incredibly strong, but Erik's resisting, holding out for Charles to follow him over. With what seems like a final burst of energy, he pushes himself up, sitting back on his haunches and dragging Charles with him.

The new angle feels like it pushes Erik's still-stiff cock impossibly deeper, and Charles lets out a sharp, high whine. It's an awkward position in some ways; he has to tip his head back against Erik's shoulder, wrap his arm behind him and around Erik's neck to anchor himself, along with Erik's hands on his waist, and he can't move very much at all – but then, he doesn't need to move much, not when every tiny shift seems to spark something bright behind in his eyes. And the position _is_ perfect for Erik to nuzzle at his ear, teasing his earlobe and whispering fond and dirty nonsense to him, all the things Charles most wants to hear and can't believe he gets to.

"What else do you need, baby," Erik murmurs, "tell me and I'll give it to you, anything you want, just let me take care of you – "

_Just this_ , Charles thinks, shutting his eyes tight, _just this exactly, I'm almost there –_ He quickens his strokes so they're on the border of too much as he clenches around Erik inside of him. He wants to luxuriate in how perfect and wet and dirty Erik's come feels inside him. He wants to stay like this forever, and he wants to come so badly he can't stand it. 

Erik moves his hands a little, and presses his fingers down _hard_ on one of the blooming marks on Charles's hips, and Charles gasps and lets go, spilling onto his hand and belly as he shares with Erik again the amazement of everything he makes him feel.

_Incredible_ , Erik thinks, the word stretched out in his head like a taut bowstring. _Can't believe you, can't believe you're here with me_. The hand he's just used to set Charles off turns gentle, easing its pressure into long, languid strokes over his stomach, trailing stickiness and affection across his skin. Charles shakes his way through his orgasm, clutching hard as he can to Erik's neck, tangling his fingers in Erik's hair so Erik has no choice but to stay close, kissing whatever part of Charles's face and neck and shoulder he can reach.

His body doesn't want to come down and his mind doesn't either; Charles wants to stay wrapped up in Erik and his afterglow for as long as he can manage it. Erik's still clutching Charles to him, still buried deep, vague thoughts about pulling out and getting them into a more comfortable position starting to coalesce, but he doesn't seem inclined to move either.

Eventually they have to, Erik helping Charles off his lap and clumsily easing him down onto his side. Erik joins him a moment later, toppling half over Charles so one long leg and arm are draped across him and he can resume lazily kissing and nosing at whatever part of Charles his available to him. For himself, Charles tries to get his breathing back in order and turns so he can see Erik and not just feel him, see his face soft and open the way it rarely is outside of whatever private space they've made together.

"That was very nice," he says, even though the words aren't really what he means.

"I'm glad it met with your approval, sir," says Erik, smirking at him before kissing him on the mouth. Charles replies with a bit more teeth than usual, saying silently _you know what I mean_ as Erik licks into him. _Yeah I do_ , Erik says in return, gentling the kiss until it's unsteady breath and lips glancing across each other.

They lie together for a while, aimlessly touching and Charles running thoughtful mental fingers over the surface of Erik's mind, never going too deep, only gentle strokes that communicate everything Charles can't say most of the time. Erik drowses, a few spare thoughts for _you love trying to exhaust me, don't you_ that lets Charles be smug, some smugness of his own when he thinks about pushing Charles through two orgasms, how Charles had looked stretched around him. 

At length, the future intrudes, a stray thought that's been percolating in Charles's head since the possibility of moving in with Erik had turned from a hypothetical into something that stood a good chance of happening. Erik senses the change in Charles's thoughts – they're that close, Charles thinks; he's never been this close with another person that they can almost see what he's thinking – and makes a sleepily inquiring noise before managing, "What is it, baby?"

"I was thinking... I should donate my furniture to a mutant shelter or day program or something," Charles says. "I mean, there's no room for it here and your stuff is a lot nicer, but I don't – I don't just want to give it up." He doesn't quite know how to explain it, that his crappy sofa and chair, his bed, the kitchen set, are the first things he's had for himself, bought without the assistance of his family. The thought of letting them go is perilously close to letting go of his independence, but maybe, he thinks, if he could see they went to places where they were needed by people on journeys harder than his own, that would make parting with them easier.

"Mm," Erik says, nosing lazily at Charles's throat. "Sounds like a good idea." Erik shares the image of the director of the mutant youth program a few blocks away from the station; Erik's had to work with her a few different times when a case has overlapped with one of her kids, and Charles can feel the shade of approval Erik has for her efforts and the work they do. "I know they're always desperate for more supplies," Erik continues out loud. "Want me to make a few calls?"

"No," Charles says, "it's something I want to do myself."

Erik makes a soft, understanding noise, and lets it go. Charles smiles to himself and, sore and worn out as he is, makes the effort of turning over in Erik's arms, so they're face to face, so close their noses are almost touching. Erik blinks at him a little blurrily.

_This is our bed_ , Charles tells him.

Erik runs his hand down Charles's sweat-slick back, coming to a rest on the fleshy curve of Charles's ass, palming it gently. _I know_.

Charles tries again: _No, but ... I mean, it's ours._

_I know_ , Erik repeats, a smile in his thoughts if not on his face. _Believe me, baby, I know._

And he _does_ know, Charles realizes after he studies how that knowledge sits in Erik's head. He knows, in the same way Charles does, a way that escapes words and neat categories and all the explanations that clog up Charles's brain when he tries to articulate them. _Ours_ reaches past that, to permanence and mutuality, to knowing that this is the bed they'll wake up in together every morning – or, Erik thinks wryly, he'll get up from to go for his run and Charles will drift up from sleep long enough to collect a good-morning kiss before passing out again.

"Ass," Charles complains, but burrows into Erik's embrace anyway. "Just for that, I'm going to make you meet _all_ my friends. And carry on actual conversations with them."

"Jesus, come quickly," Erik says dryly. He traces absent fingers up and down Charles's back, slowly, the way Charles likes best. Along with them, Erik's thoughts trace out a path wandering through days and spaces inhabited together, coming back from his run to find Charles at the coffee, Charles at the table surrounded by books and laptop, dragging Charles away to the shower. There's a strange vacancy, thinking of Charles not coming to work with him, but it doesn't have the bitterness of before – a little resignation, but a resignation lightened by Erik knowing Charles will be _here_.

"You won't be able to get rid of me," Charles says to Erik's collar bone. "You're stuck with me, I'm afraid. There isn't a return policy."

"I'll learn to make do somehow, I suppose." Erik's mind is drifting again, and those images of their future together fade as his thoughts migrate in the opposite direction, through all the months they've been together, through the weeks they worked together before that, all the way back to that first time. An afternoon like any other afternoon; what were the odds that it would be that moment that he decided to stop for a pack of cigarettes, that it would be that bodega he stepped into? 

Charles sees himself through Erik's memory – the shock in his eyes, brighter and bluer in Erik's head than Charles thinks they really are; his mouth, catching Erik's attention even then, twisted as it was into a wary scowl. Here in bed, Erik's hand traces a path down Charles's arm, stopping to wrap his slim long fingers around Charles's wrist, unconsciously mirroring what he did when he stopped Charles that first day.

They've come a long way, Charles thinks, surprising himself with the deep satisfaction that comes with the thought. He shares it with Erik, and Erik sighs, his breath a warm puff against Charles's hair and scalp.

"We should clean you up before you fall asleep like that," Erik says vaguely, but he doesn't loosen his grip on Charles at all.

"I'm all right," Charles says. "Just hold me like this a little while longer." It's less a request than an order, as he falls into his most imperious tone again, but even though Erik snorts and lets Charles see the combination of amusement and fond exasperation it provokes in him, he still obeys, adjusting his grip to tuck Charles in against him more comfortably.

Unsurprisingly, he falls asleep right away and wakes up much later, sticky and sore, definitely ready to be cleaned up. Erik's still asleep next to him, down deep enough that Charles can pull away a little without disturbing him (and that's new; he has to pause, realizing that Erik's always woken up before if Charles so much as twitches in a way different from normal sleep), and look his fill for a while. Erik's face is one of those that doesn't usually soften when he's asleep; his dreams are too vivid, twisted too deep in him, for Erik to really relax. But he's softer than usual tonight, and what Charles senses of his dreams is blurry and soft, not a nightmare this time.

He soothes away a spike of wakefulness as he eases himself up, urging Erik back down into dreamstate. He won't be gone long.

The lights are still on, dim as they are, but even if they weren't, Charles knows his way to the bathroom, his mind laying the map of the room out for him. Everything around him seems new and different, remarkable, as if a spotlight has been shone on them. It's ridiculous, Charles tells himself as he grabs a washcloth and turns on the water, waiting for it to warm, because he's done this often enough. It's only the fact that it's _his_ space now, too, that's different. And it's not even really his yet, with his name still needing to be added to the lease and his stuff needing to settle in alongside Erik's... but, Charles thinks, beginning to clean his belly and thighs, this is already more his place than it's ever been before.

On his way back out to the bedroom, where Erik's a warmly drowsing presence in the topography of Charles's perceptions, he catches sight of a dancing glow in the corner of his eye.

The Hanukkah candles, he remembers. They hadn't extinguished them before going to bed, but last night Erik had said they shouldn't and the candles only burned for so long anyway before they'd go out on their own. Squinting, Charles can just make out the flames creeping down to the very last of the wicks, their wax dripping over the silver of the menorah. The leading candle, the shamash, has already gone out, of course, and the candles for the second and third nights have gone out as well; the flames of the first and fourth nights are guttering, but determined to burn on.

Might as well let them, Charles decides. He turns the lights off in the living room, although he lets the Christmas lights keep going too, and turns on his heel to flip the switch for the bedroom light.

He finds his way back to Erik in the darkness, sliding into bed and back into Erik's arms. It's second nature – first nature, really, if Charles is honest – to orient himself to Erik, to shift under Erik's arm and settle against his chest, to tangle their legs together so he's surrounded by warmth. Before he forgets, he pulls their forgotten blankets up and over them, chasing away the nighttime coolness that's settled on Erik's skin.

_Good night_ , Charles thinks, pressing the words, soft as a kiss, against Erik's dreamquiet mind. Erik sighs and pulls Charles closer, and Charles wraps himself up in the knowledge that this is _his_ , here and now and always, and shuts his eyes.


	5. Epilogue

After the weeks of planning – lists, and more lists, and more lists after that, until Charles was reasonably sure Erik was ready to strangle him, and one or two not-so-gentle reminders of scale when Charles threatened to go a little overboard – after all that, the party itself is easy. Easy, and calm, and fun, with absolutely nothing in common with a single one of the parties of Charles's youth at the mansion, every single one of which could be more accurately referred to a gala, a fête, or a soiree. It's a million times better, and Charles feels a little dumb at using over-enthusiasm to compensate for anxiety, but mostly relieved.

Charles is busy enough making the rounds, talking and laughing with all the guests and double-checking that everybody's enjoying themselves, that it takes him a while to realize he's managed to lose track of the thread of Erik's mind.

_Erik?_ Charles thinks curiously, looking around the room. He's nowhere in sight, and leave it to Erik to be misanthropic at the party he's supposed to be hosting.

_This way!_ Erik says, surprisingly cheerfully. Charles follows the trail of his thoughts down the hall and into the bedroom. 

The room is dim, only one lamp on, shining over the massive pile of coats covering the bed. The closet door is closed, but there's more light shining from underneath it. When Charles slides it open, he finds Erik and Jean, sitting on the floor with a bottle of wine between them.

Jean grins up at him sheepishly from under her red curls, like a kid who's gotten caught at something. Erik smiles. _Hey, baby,_ he says, and Charles realizes with some amusement that Erik's already happily buzzed. 

Charles raises his eyebrow, leaning against the jamb of the closet door. "You two having fun hiding out in here?"

"Erik's been showing me how to make sculptures out of wire hangers," Jean tells him, lifting up a tiny metal flower to show him. She frowns, and then begins to stumble up to her feet. "I'm going to go check on Scott; Emma's annoying him. It was nice meeting you, Erik."

Erik raises his hand in a wordless acknowledgment. Jean actually _winks_ at Charles, _he's not quite the ogre Scott thinks he is_ , as she slides by him on her way out to the living room.

Charles waits until Jean's left the room to sit down, settling himself into her spot against the wall. His own clothes – not many, mostly khakis and button-downs – are hanging up over Erik's shoulder, his battered suitcase tucked into the corner. His shoes have their own rack because Erik's _particular_ about keeping things off the closet floor. Still, _his_. The thought sings in him, almost too good for him to believe it all over again.

"What happened to being mortal enemies?" Charles asks with the grin that never fails to get Erik's back up, like petting a cat the wrong way. "I'd thought Jean was going to faint when she met you, and now I find you two here drinking the wine Emma brought and making..." He picks up the tiny sculpture Erik's made. "The top of the Empire State Building."

Erik grunts, but it's a transitory irritation. He shifts from his spot over to Charles, one long arm draping itself across his shoulders. Automatically, Charles slides up close so he's nearly in Erik's lap, but not quite, his head secure in the cradle between Erik's shoulder and chest. With an absent gesture, Erik tugs the sculpture free of Charles's hands and sets it to rotating, a few absent gestures here and there to smooth out a few kinks. It's an elegant, subtle display of Erik's power, different from the practicality Charles sees in the kitchen or the field, or the ruthlessness he knows Erik's capable of.

"She's got a good head on her shoulders," Erik admits, a foggy bit of _not as good as yours_ drifting alongside the confession. "But you wouldn't be friends with her if she didn't."

"Exactly my point." He can't help needling Erik, just a little bit, for his skepticism regarding Jean and Scott, although the party's already done much to blunt the edge of Erik's uncertainties.

"But more importantly," Erik lets the sculpture settle back into Charles's hand, "she said I was good for you. Which tells me she has good judgment. And," he starts to stroke Charles's hair, "she cares about you, too. I didn't need to be a telepath to work that out."

"You see plenty on your own, Detective Lehnsherr," Charles says fondly.

They both see a lot. They both read, Charles reading minds and Erik reading evidence. They've started, Charles thinks, to learn how to read each other, in the spaces between lines and in the margins. They've been guilty of misreading each other, and it'll probably happen again. Not as often, though, Charles tells himself. Not nearly as often.

Charles picks up the wine bottle, which is almost empty, just enough left for a few more swigs. "Here's to us, darling," Charles says, taking a swallow. Emma, not surprisingly, has excellent taste in wine, and Charles savors the mouthful before handing the bottle to Erik.

Erik takes the wine and swallows down the last of it, before setting the bottle back down. He turns his head to kiss Charles, soft and lingering and comfortable, the wine flavoring everything. 

"Ready to go back to the party?" Charles says softly. He spares part of his attention to check in with the people back in the living room, confirming everyone's still having a good time. He grins, suddenly, as he hears Logan saying _MacTaggert, tell these two about the time you and Erik had to work a case together, back when he was still in Vice. The one when he made that assistant D.A. cry_. "Moira's telling stories about when you guys first met. You probably want to get out there before she ruins your reputation completely.”

Erik groans, though it's still fairly good-natured. "I'd rather stay in here with you," he grumbles, but he raises himself up to his feet nonetheless, pulling Charles up along with him. Charles doesn't even have to say it, because they both know it now: there will be time enough for them to be alone later, when the party's over. They have all the time in the world.

He follows Erik through the bedroom and out into the hall, still holding hands, back to the room where their friends are waiting.


End file.
